


Messenger Number 3

by gamesformay



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Episode: s06e20 The Man Who Would Be King, Familial Angst, M/M, Macbeth - Freeform, Shakespeare, Theatre, Winchester Brothers - Freeform, never-ending The Man Who Would Be King references
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-10
Updated: 2013-07-10
Packaged: 2017-12-18 09:39:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 23,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/878376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gamesformay/pseuds/gamesformay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Opening night is closing in at the Lawrence Shakespeare Festival, and the play is cursed. As if that weren't enough for Dean, the head of the tech crew, to have on his mind. A tale of love, family, and iambic pentameter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Messenger Number 3

**Author's Note:**

> Both of the boys work in the theater in this fic, so there's a few instances of fairly specific vocabulary (relating to shakespeare, acting, technical theater, etc.). If you aren't familiar with a term, feel free to consult the Handy Dandy Messenger Footnote, which I've posted separately for your convenience. In the story, each included term is followed by an asterisk.  
> Thanks for reading; I'd love to see your comments. Enjoy!

 

* * *

 

_Love is a familiar, love is a devil. There is no evil angel but love._

_\- William Shakespeare_

****

\------- ---- ---------

 **** ****

It's just Dean's luck that the year he brings his blundering moose of a kid brother along on the job, they're doing a motherfucking cursed play.

He hadn't known about the "cursed" part at the time, or else he would've told Sammy to stay at Stanford over the summer and wait tables like a normal college kid, instead of inviting him to come back home and move heavy objects in small dark spaces for six weeks. Hell, Dean only learned about the curse a few hours ago, and it's already the first preview rehearsal. The stagehands were bitching about the director.

"I heard Crowley actually kicked somebody out of a rehearsal for saying the M word," Jo reported.

"'Milf'?" Dean asked.

"No, assbasket, the name of the play."

"What, Mac-"

In a moment of cosmic weirdness, Jo, Ed, and Harry all "Shh!"ed simultaneously. Sam, at least, had the decency to look confused.

Dean blinked. "You guys are givin' me weird flashbacks to my middle school librarian." He grinned, reminiscing. "Man, talk about the M word."

"This play's cursed, dumbass. How d'you not know that?"

He scoffed. "Cursed. Yeah, okay."

"It is! You can't say the name in a theater, especially when a show's being put on, or crazy shit starts happening. People get injured. They say the first time it was performed somebody accidentally switched a prop with a real knife. The dude _died_."

"Then what the hell are you supposed to do when you're actually doing the freakin' play? Guy's the main character, they drop his name a few times."

"When you're not actually saying the lines, you say 'the Scottish play'. The character's 'the Scotsman', or 'the Scottish king', or, uh, some people go with 'Mackers'-"

"Yeah, okay, yeah, ‘Asshole-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named’, I got it. What do you guys think?"

Harry gave a noncommittal shrug. "I dunno. I mean, not many people really believe in it, but it's, y'know, an etiquette thing. Not saying it."

"Riiiight." Dean pushed himself to his feet, stood on the edge of the stage, and looked out at the house* (or, more accurately, empty grass and Bobby's sound tent). The Lawrence Shakespeare Festival operates out of a few conveniently bowl-shaped acres outside in the park, a natural amphitheater. One thing Dean knows after working tech in this place for the last eight summers: Sound travels _awesome_ out here.

He took in a huge breath. Got as far as "MAC-" before several things happened at once.

"Dean, don't be a dick!" called Ash from the scaffold.

"I'll mess up that pretty face if I have to, Winchester," said Pamela, wielding her power drill.

"You tryin' to bring calamity on us all?" Missouri sounded scandalized.

Bobby's dulcet tones, all the way from the sound tent: "WATCH IT, BOY."

Dean collapsed with a huff. "Fine, I won't say 'Macbeth'."

Jo groaned.

****

So, yeah, he'd been skeptical. But that was before everything dropped into hell, climbed back up, and bit him on the ass.

****

None of it was really Sammy's fault. Not like the kid can help being made out of ten thousand miles of limbs. And that crazy-ass stray dog, the one that decided its two joys in life were Sam and knocking shit over... well, he couldn't have helped that. Ellen chased the thing off with a broom and the afternoon went on (more or less) as planned.

No, shit didn't _really_ start to go down until the actors arrived. What else is new.

Apparently Dean jacked up some good karma at some point in his life, because the remaining twenty minutes before the show begins pass without a hitch. Ash fixes the whacked out gobos*, Chuck gets some Advil, Balthazar decides to actually be competent at the 'stage managing' thing for once, and everybody's good to go. Hell, Dean even gets to sit in the wings and watch the play.

He listens to the opening speech ("Welcome everybody, I'm Chuck Shurley, the executive director* here at Lawrence Shakespeare Festival, and welcome to our eighth season! Season _eight_? More like, season gr _eight_!Ha....ha ha..."), and they're off.

Disasters or none, Dean's read this one. A lot. Okay, sure, maybe he isn’t as apathetic toward Shakespeare as he pretends to be, maybe he’s actually a huge fucking nerd for the stuff, but no one needs to know that. This one just happens to be his favorite.

And, even if his seat does kinda suck, he can see that the show's gonna be a crowd pleaser this year. The artsy 'minimal' shit actually works, and Missouri's simple, loose-fitting costumes look cool and creepy under the colored lights. The casting's good; Crowley, dick though he is, knows what he's doing. Meg's Lady Macbeth looks way too natural to be normal, the new kid Adam makes a badass Malcolm, and, as much as Luc skeeves Dean out, Macduff rocks.

But no one'd really care if the rest of them sucked, as long as Macbeth's good. And, Dean decides, he is. Fucking awesome, actually. He's a good-looking, dark-haired guy, and the dude sweats charisma. Dean has always hated that dumb cliche about people "commanding" the stage, but he'll be damned if this guy's not doing it.

Still, they're almost to the part where everybody starts dying and Macdreamy still hasn't totally proven himself- not in Dean's book, anyway. Nah, before he can make a judgment (and Sam would laugh at him until the end of time if he knew), Dean has to see that speech.

Macduff and his army of badasses disguise themselves as trees. Macbeth paces on his guard tower or whatever, bitchfacing Sammy to shame. He's supp'd full with horrors. Somebody comes on to tell him that the queen bit it.

Dean cranes his neck.

An agonized sound, like a wounded animal. "She should have died hereafter!" His sword clatters to the ground. Silence. "There would have been..." Another pained sound. "... _time_ , for such a word." He lifts his head toward the house; the little preview rehearsal audience of dozing old people gets some Blue Steel. "Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow...Creeps in this petty pace, from day to day, to the last syllable of recorded time, and all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way...to dusty... _death_!"

It's a helluva performance, Dean thinks. It has power and charisma, and a shit ton of good old-fashioned angst. He wants to love it.

The soliloquy ends, the king is interrupted by yet another messenger, and Dean finds himself on his crappy folding chair in the dark, feeling empty.

****

\------- ---- ---------

 

Castiel stands in the darkness and hears himself breathe. His cue line is coming, and the universe hangs in the balance.

 _Any second now_. He calms himself with deep, tidal breaths- measured gulps of air from his diaphragm, like they teach you in drama school. _Alright, just breathe. In.._.

The line. This is it.

His feet move without him telling them to. The orange lights explode in his face; he's exposed, his skin is on fire, he doesn't need his eyes to find his spike mark on the floor, which is good because he can't see anyway.

_....out._

"The queen, my lord, is dead," says Castiel.

He watches as Michael's face contorts with anguish. "She should have died hereafter!" Michael shouts.

****

Exit.

****

Back in the wings, Castiel stands against the wall, eyes closed. He listens to the speech. If anyone were watching, they might notice the subtle movements of his mouth as he reverently traces the beloved words. No one is, though, so no one does.

****

\------- ---- --------- 

****

They're closing in on the final battle, and no disasters yet. Dean almost forgets that he fucking jinxed the play and is at this moment running the Preview* From Hell.

Almost.

Macbeth has just whipped out a really snappy scene-ending couplet ("Blow wind, come wrack! At least we'll die with harness on our back!") when Dean spots Sam out of the corner of his eye. He's stumbling through the dark, a tottering pile of heavy quarterstaffs* in his arms.

Oh Jesus.

He leaps to his feet and hisses " _Sam!_ "

Looking for all the world like a moose caught in the headlights, Sam whirls around, quarter staffs and all, and there's a sickening _THONK_ of wood against skull.

"Don't move!" Dean whispers as Sam starts forward. The kid's face has morphed from 'slightly frazzled' to 'just witnessed the slaughter of a thousand baby bunnies' in under five seconds. "Just- don't move!"

Some poor sap has slid down the wall into a pile on the floor, clutching his forehead. Shit shit _shit_.

Dean gets down on his knees and tries to take a look. Not that it does much good, considering he can't even make out the guy's face. Hell, Dean hadn't noticed him here until Sammy'd nearly brained him with a pole.

"Hey, hey buddy. You okay? You bleeding?"

The guy cautiously moves his hand from his face, then snaps it right back. In the darkness, Dean gets a flash of blue, red, and more red.

"Oh _fuck_ \- okay, c'mon, let's go man, I can't see shit back here. C'mon, up and at 'em."

He finally gets him to his feet, works an arm awkwardly around him, and drags him in the direction of the backstage door. For some reason, Dean's surprised to note that the guy's almost as tall as he is. They get outside into the little fenced in area behind the stage, where the prop mistress is having a smoke. Dean hauls the poor bastard bodily into a trailer, flops him down onto a chair, grabs the first aid kit, and crouches down in front of him.

"Okay, let's see what we got here."

He doesn't move.

"Gonna need you to move your hands, buddy." He really doesn't want to focus on how much red has stained those long fingers.

"No, thank you."

Good, he can talk. (Gravel dragged over rocks, broken glass, and more gravel. Surprising. And distracting.) A trip to the ER is the last thing Dean needs right now.

"You wanna let my moron kid brother get away with murder? C'mon, man up."

The guy moves his hands with a shiver, uncovering his forehead and eyes. Dean sucks in a breath. So that's where the blue came from.

The wound doesn't look like it's bleeding a whole lot anymore, but Dean gets a cloth out of the kit and puts pressure on it anyway. The red already drying in his dark hair and crusting over his brow is pretty damn freaky.

The guy notices. "Bad?"

Dean bites his lip, then smirks. "Never shake thy gory locks at me."*

He gets a hilariously deadpan stare for that one. "Macbeth jokes. That's clever."

"You said the M word."

"I've already had an attempt on my life this evening; I think I'm well and thoroughly cursed already."

"Yeah, well, I'd rather have you un-concussed, cursed or not." Dean digs through his pocket for his keys.

"Thank you. I'm sorry to be so much trouble."

"What, I'm gonna just let you bleed to death? You high?" He finds the tiny flashlight on his key ring. "Anyway, Sammy spent his entire childhood smashing his head in on shit, I know the drill." Dean shines the light into one (ridiculously) blue eye. The pupil shrinks. "Okay, cool, your brain isn't fucked up. Probably. You know where you are? Tired? Gonna hurl?"

"A trailer at the Lawrence Shakespeare Festival, no, and no."

"What's your name?"

"Really, I'm fine."

"Not about your brain, dude, just wanna know your name.” He looks up from the little plastic first aid kit and smiles. “I'm Dean."

"Castiel."

Dean raises his eyebrows. "Wacky stage name?"

"No. Uh. Wacky parents."

“Oh. Cool.” He gets to work cleaning the gore off Castiel’s face. “Listen, I’m really sorry about this. Sam, I mean; I should’ve been watching.”

"It's perfectly fine, it wasn't your fault. Nor Sam's. Accidents happen."

"Nah, I mean...I dunno. I'm supposed to look after the kid. He's never done tech anywhere, I should keep a better eye on him. He was nearly mauled by a batshit dog on my watch earlier. Anyway," he jokes, "it's my own damn fault the production's cursed. I said the M word."

"I suppose that means we're both cursed."

"Ha, yeah." Castiel stares a lot. Dean looks down and digs for bandages.

A few minutes pass in silence while Dean puts Castiel's head back together. "Who d'you play? I don't remember seeing you out there."

"I'm ensemble."*

"Yeah? Cool."

"Yes. Technically, my character is listed in the script as 'Third Messenger'."

"Yeah, awesome. ...Uh, sorry, I couldn't see shit from my spot, I didn't-"

"No, it's alright. I only have one line. I'm easy to miss."

"And?"

"What?"

"What's your line?"

For a second, Castiel looks nervous. "It would be Seyton's, but he's not in this cutting. It's, uh, 'The queen, my lord, is dead'."

"Oh, you're _that_ guy! Yeah, I saw you,” Dean flails, “you, uh, you start off that one speech, don't you? ‘Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow’? It’s my favorite." Dean feels like even more of a dick than he did at the start of this conversation.

"Yes," Castiel answers. Dean can’t tell if he hates him or is just the most deadpan son of bitch who’s ever lived. Maybe both.

Castiel tilts his head and draws his eyebrows together. “You...” He sounds confused.

“What?”

“You don’t look like the type to...”

“Like Shakespeare?”

“Yeah.”

Dean shuffles his feet a little. Not like he’s ever told this to anyone else here, cast and crew alike. He’s proud of his ability to go through eight years of working a Shakespeare Festival without anyone thinking that he’s read a word of the stuff. He’s a got a rep to uphold; _Sam’s_ the nerdy one, after all. As far as they know Dean’s just a grunt, the brawn to his brother’s brains, and he plans to keep it that way.

Still, Dean remembers who he’s talking to. Not likely a Shakespearean actor’s gonna judge him for geekiness. Besides, there’s something about this guy; maybe it’s those damn eyes of his and the _I see your very soul_ vibe they’re lazering into his skull right now. Something that makes Dean wanna spill his guts. And, before he can stop himself, spill his guts he does.

It comes up like vomit.

“There was this one time when I was fourteen that I decided I didn’t wanna go home right after school because I knew my dad’d be wasted and my little brother’d be hiding in his room crying and I wouldn’t be able to do shit about it, and I just didn’t feel like dealin’ with it, so I wandered into the drama club room and some kid was doing a speech- Prince Hal, the one when he’s, y’know, he’s telling his dad that he’s not a fuckup like he thinks he is- ‘And in the closing of some glorious day, be bold to tell you that _I am your son_ -’” Dean is rambling, he couldn’t shut up if his life depended on it. “And I went back the next day, and the day after that, and I told my dad that I joined the weightlifting team because there’s no way in hell he’d put up with me wasting my time on pansy-ass poetry shit. I didn’t like lyin’ to him it but I had to, I was hooked on the crap, I couldn’t keep myself away...”

He trails off, looking into Castiel’s big fucking lazer eyes, the kind that people write sonnets about, and says “I love it.”

There’s silence in the trailer.

Dean’d be in less shock if a goddamn pterodactyl had just flown out of his throat. _Where the hell did that come from?!_ Castiel just keeps staring.

Before Dean has time to make a bigger ass of himself in front of the seriously hot actor who stares too much, a bunch of sweaty thespians pour into the trailer. He could kiss every goddamn one of them.

"Alright kids, kindly get your shit together and try your darnedest not to break anything too expensive. Notes in a bit." Balthazar doesn't look up from his smart phone. "Dean, I know Cassie's cute, but don't you have things to- I don't know, lift?"

Except Balthazar.

Castiel looks horrified. "The show's over? Oh God... I missed my last scene. And curtain call."

The keys on the smart phone keep clicking away. "How unfortunate. I'm the stage manager, dearest, not the babysitter."

"Wait, but- is Crowley angry?"

Balthazar spares a glance up to look condescending, then turns to leave. "Do calm down, Castiel," he tosses over his shoulder. "No one noticed."

Right then what Dean _really_ wants to do is chase Balthazar down and cave his face in with a quarterstaff. Instead, he turns to Castiel and says "Get your stuff, I'm gonna go tell Bobby I'm driving you home."

He's a hell of a sight: stupidly blue eyes widening in his face, flushed with humiliation and crusty with dried blood. "That really isn't necessary..."

"Dude. I don't care if you don't have a concussion, no way you're driving looking like you just climbed out of a bad zombie flick. You can get your notes later. Deal with it."

"What about Sam?"

"After all the shit that went down tonight, I'll be there and back long before he's done. Bet that fucking dog showed up again."

Ten minutes later, Dean's in the car with a silent, cranky, very attractive actor and no goddamn clue what to say.

"So, uh. What other stuff you done? Plays, I mean." He sounds awkward even to his own ears. _Godammit, man, you're supposed to be the hot brother_.

"Not anything terribly interesting,” Castiel answers. “I've always been ensemble."

"Wait, really?"

Shit, the man can glare. It’s weirdly hot, like pretty much everything about this dude, and Dean has to remind himself that he's operating a moving vehicle. "Yes. It's not uncommon."

"No, I mean, not even when you were a kid or something?” Dean’s flailing. Again. “Hell, Sammy was in a play in high school, and they gave him a bunch of lines." He grins. One time somebody missed their cue, leaving Sam to stand alone on the stage and ad-lib about Mrs. Webb's torrid affair with the milkman. It's one of Dean's better memories from their childhood. "And he can't act for shit."

"I played Benvolio* once,” he says, then he gets a weird look on his face. “And there was, uh, in high school, I...." Castiel rubs nervously at the back of his neck. It is not cute because Dean is not thirteen and that word is fucking stupid. "I was in, um, I was in _Cabaret_."

Dean completely loses his shit.

"It's not that funny." Castiel's face, back to deadly serious and dignified, just makes the whole thing even more damn hilarious.

"With, like," Dean manages to gasp out through his laughter, "the fishnets and the whole shebang?"

"I wasn't the Emcee, I was Cliff. There was no cross-dressing involved."

"Nope, too late, the image of you singing 'Willkommen' is in my brain forever."

"I wore a suit," he says weakly.

"You can sing?"

"No, I can't. I attended public school in Kansas. The drama department had very limited resources." Dean imagines the intensity of that glare blowing his head up, science fair volcano style. He has a feeling that Castiel is trying. Might be fair, all things considered. "I don't see why this is so funny, Dean."

Finally calming himself down, Dean says "Nah, nah you wouldn't, would you, Cas?"

It's out before he even considers it, and he wonders if Castiel is one of those people who get all pissed off when you shorten their names. He looks unfazed, so Dean keeps talking. "Yeah, anyway. So, uh. Yeah."

Why is he so fucking awkward? He's good at this shit. Yeah, so Cas had gone and gotten his face smashed in and rubbed the back of his neck and been in a dumb musical and let Dean call him a stupid nickname like they're best buds and been generally scary and endearing at the same time. Whatever. Dean's good at it.

He wonders if this is what Sam feels like _all the time_.

Firing away, he asks "You do Shakespeare if you can get it, huh?”

"Yes."

"Why?" Shit. "No, I didn't mean it like that, I mean, that's just gotta be-"

"No, I understand. It does have its limitations." Castiel is quiet in a different way than other people are quiet. When other people are quiet, they shut up. Castiel's quiet in the kind of way that sage old masters in movies are quiet, like they're thinking really deep shit. "The words," he says.

Dean's too busy imagining Cas wearing a brown robe and finishing sentences with 'young Skywalker' to notice how weird that answer is. "The words?"

"Yes."

Dean digs Shakespeare. A lot, actually, like, a lot. Still, he’s never been the best at the poetry crap. Iambs and tetrameter and couplets and shit.* He mixes it all up, forgets if it’s the stressed or unstressed syllable that goes first. Not his gig. "Yeah. They are, uh,” he fumbles desperately. “They're pretty."

"It's not just that. They're..." Castiel sighs, and it's a frustrated sound. "I don't know. They're like spells. You...you feel  them." _Young Skywalker_.

"Huh. Yeah."

"It's hard to explain."

"Yeah. Well, uh. You're passionate about it, so, that's. That's good." Dean hates himself. A lot. "You'll get a good part eventually, you gotta."

"Actually, this is my last play."

If Cas is the old master, Dean's the shocked girl with the spit-take. "Your- what?"

"After _Macbeth_ closes, I'm moving to Boston." His gravelly (sweet _Jesus_ ) voice is matter-of-fact. "My father and siblings run the family business from there. Apparently there's a place for an employee with nothing but a bachelor's in drama."

"You're leaving in a month?" Dean’s brain isn’t working.

"Thereabouts, yes."

"You're giving up acting?"

"Don't sound so shocked, Dean. I was never any good to begin with."

They're silent. Dean feels like a dick again. Except this time he kind of wants to punch something.

"So, you got a family?"

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

"So, you got a family?" Dean's shoulders are tense as he stares resolutely at the road. Castiel clings gratefully to the non sequitur.

"Yes. Four brothers, two sisters. Only five of them work for Father, though; Gabriel has his own, uh... business here in Lawrence. He's a regular employee of the Festival, actually."

"Wait-" Dean sputters. " _Gabriel_? The Gabriel who runs around before the show like, juggling fire and shit?"

"The very same."

"Oh. Well, damn."

"Apparently it's quite a lucrative endeavor. I imagine that's why Father doesn't object too strongly to his son running a business called 'The Travelin' Tricksters'."

"Must be a blast at Thanksgiving." That unreal grin happens on his face again, and his eyes flash green and wicked in the dark. There's something fictional about Dean, Castiel thinks; Dean, with his dangerous car and dangerous smile. It's the sort of thing you see in the movies, or on stage. Impossible.

"You have no idea," Castiel says. Eager to move from his family, he asks "You and Sam are close?"

"We used to be, yeah. I pretty much raised the kid."

"Used to be?" Castiel regrets it as soon as he says it. They're slipping into dangerous territory again.

"Yeah, well." Dean shrugs brusquely. "Shit happens, y'know. Sammy went off to law school, Dad died. Other way around, actually. But. Yeah."

He hasn't moved his eyes from the road, but his voice has changed intangibly. For just a moment, so brief Castiel nearly missed it, Dean’s fiction slipped; he called for line*. Castiel has a fleeting, guilty regret that he hadn't been watching more closely.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be, man, it was years ago. So, uh, we just don't really talk much is all."

"You seem so close backstage." Even though he hadn't known them, Castiel noticed the brothers' good-natured ribbing and practical jokes. It's impossible not to.

"That's the weird thing. This is the first time he's been home since he left, and, I dunno, something about the job- makes us kinda like we used to be." Dean's mouth tilts with a strange smile. "Y'know, I wasn't even gonna take the job this year,” he says thoughtfully.

“I'm not a techie by trade; I run my dad's old repair shop. But Bobby's a friend of the family and some of the skills cross over, so I've been working the Festival nights all the summers since it opened, since I was kid...I wasn't gonna do it this time, though. Thought I'd renovate the shop. But then Sam called and said he couldn't find summer work in California... So I took it. How 'bout that."

Dean's eyes are far away. "And, y'know, sometimes, it really is a lot like the old days, back when the three of us ran the shop... Sammy'd break shit, I'd yell at him, then we'd break some more shit clowning around, Dad'd kick our asses..." He shrugs. "Not like it lasts or anything, when we get home. But it's, y'know... cool."

"That sounds like a great thing, Dean." Castiel means it.

"Man, why am I boring you with this shit?" Dean grabs for the radio dials. Castiel tells himself to be grateful for it. This is wrong of him, these secrets are not for him to hear. For now, he'll be 'that guy Sammy almost killed', and later he'll be gone.

And that will be enough.

The chorus of a rock song fills the car. 'Ramble On', Castiel remembers.

"Aw, awesome!" Dean sighs happily, relaxes back into the seat. "Nothing like some Zeppelin after a long day of cheating death, huh?"

 _Got no time for spreading roots, the time has come to be gone. And to our health we drank a thousand times, it’s time to ramble on_.

Something occurs to Castiel."You love Led Zeppelin?"

"Is the pope Catholic?"

"They make you happy."

"Damn straight."

"That's like the words."

"Huh?"

"You asked me 'why Shakespeare?', earlier, and my answer was the words. The way Led Zeppelin makes you feel. That's how the words feel to me." Castiel chastises himself. Why does he want so badly for Dean to understand? To understand him?

"That...Huh." Dean watches the road, looking thoughtful. "You know, that actually made sense."

And, to Castiel's surprise, Castiel believes him.

Some time later the song fades out, followed by a floaty acoustic intro. For some reason, Dean shouts a laugh. "Speakuhtha devil!"

It's only once Dean starts singing along that Castiel understands:

"Loooove struck Romeo, sings the streets a serenade, layin' everybody looow, with a love song thaaat he maaade...."

"Your voice is awful." Castiel tries hard to bite back his grin.

"Hey man, we weren't all in _Cabaret_."

He wants to be irritated at that but Dean, back to singing along, tips his head toward Castiel. The impossible grin is back in spades. He looks straight at Castiel and drawls, off-key: "You and me, babe. How 'booout iiiit?" He winks one beautiful green eye. Castiel’s lungs fly into his throat.

"I don’t think I’ve heard Dire Straits since second grade. In the years since I've never had the impression that I was missing much." That might be more recent than the last time he actually _blushed_ , like a _child_ , but it's dark and Dean need not know.

"First rule, dude: Driver picks the music. Shotgun shuts his cakehole. And hey, you should like this one! C’mon, man, you were actually in this play, you said so!”

“No, I- I played _Benvolio_ -”

He isn’t listening. Looking thoroughly content, Dean leans back into the headrest and belts soulfully, horrifically: "Wheeeen you gonna realize, it was just that the tiiiime was wrong, Julieeeeet?"

****

Dean pulls up to Castiel's building just as the song ends. Once home, Castiel quickly gives up on the task of cleaning the dried blood from his hair without soaking his bandages and goes to bed. He discovers that he can't sleep; his mind is too cluttered with words.

_You're leaving in a month?_

_Got no time for spreading roots, the time has come to be gone._

_Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow._

_You and me, babe_.

_When you gonna realize, it was just that the time was wrong?_

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

When Dean pulls into the Festival parking lot, it's completely empty except for his brother: sitting on the curb, bitchface engaged.

"Get ditched at the prom, Sammy?"

Sam doesn't get up from the pavement, and his pursed lips only amplify the 'pissed off teenage girl' look. "No, actually, my brother took off without telling me and left me here."

"C'mon, dude, I was gone for like twenty minutes."

"Forty five, but it doesn't matter." He stands. "You couldn't've told me where you were going? I thought you forgot about me! I mean, I like waiting in creepy dark parking lots as much as the next guy-"

"I was driving that guy home! Remember, the one you nearly killed with a stick? I shoulda made you do it, you're the one who couldn't watch where you were going."

"Wha-" Dean finds some satisfaction in watching him flail. "That was an accident! It was dark, you called me, I turned around- I would've helped if-"

"You woulda, yeah, whatever. You know what, man, fuckin' sue me for cleaning up your messes."

"My- _what?_ "

The annoyance on Sam's face has turned to shock, but it's too late for Dean to back out now. He manages to hate himself only a little for turning back toward the car when he says "Wouldn't be the first time."

He can't see Sam's expression now, but he doesn't need to. "If you're trying to say something, Dean, I think you should say it."

Why tonight is different, Dean doesn't know. There's nothing new about this. It's the same tension that's strung them out for weeks. It's the same stupid crap that ruined everything. Nothing has changed between them for years. Tonight, though, Dean explodes.

"I'm just sayin' that I get real tired of being left to fix everything, that's what I'm trying to say!"

"That's it?"

It's scary, because Dean doesn't remember a time when he couldn't recognize a look on his brother's face. Sam continues. "We fight every night about nothing, all because you still can't-"

"Still can't feel all happy and fuzzy about you taking off as soon as Dad was in the ground?" Dean growls.  "Nah, guess I can't. Dad was dead and you _left_ , Sam. How the hell am I supposed to get over that?"

There's a pause, and Dean knows it's Sam gathering up all the dewy-eyed chick flick feelings he can muster. "I was wrong. I know that. I've been trying to make amends but you never seem to want to, and it's just that...." He feels Sam give up, sees the desperation in the pull of his mouth, and hears him throw a punch in the form of "It was years ago, Dean! Dad controlled you when he was alive and he's still doing it now that he's dead!"

The brothers stare at each other across the parking lot, and something intangible passes through the darkness between them. Dean turns, heads back to the Impala, and tosses over his shoulder:

"Get a cab."

 **** ****

\------- ---- ---------

****

The next day, Castiel has some time to kill before rehearsal, so he resolves to finish a box or two. He promised himself that he would get his packing done in the next few days so he won't have to worry about it once the show opens. Considering the size of his shoebox of an apartment, getting everything but the necessities together shouldn't be as much of a task as it's proving itself to be. Funny, though, the magnitude of stuff a place can accumulate over five years.

He also has a bad habit of pausing to look over all the things he unearths. Grainy photos are examined, old notebooks flipped through, odd this-and-thats carefully slotted into the timeline in his mind. A crumpled ticket stub from some on-campus performance art spectacle. They were...nineteen? He went with Anna and they got bored after ten minutes. They sat in her apartment instead; _The Fellowship of the Ring_ was on TV.

He smiles at the memory. They’d been best friends through high school, college, and after, but the Macbeth read-through was the first time they'd seen each other in months. She seemed eager to rekindle their friendship. She hadn’t known, then, that after a period of weeks he’d never see her again. Castiel feels guilty for ignoring her, but he knows it's for the best.

He also knows that packing, while practical, is at this moment serving as nothing more than a way to put off checking his email. He carefully tucks the ticket stub between the pages of his favorite _Complete Works_ * for safekeeping, takes a deep breath, and sits himself down at his laptop.

He tells himself not to get his hopes up. His dad hasn’t answered any of his messages since he graduated, why should this time be any different?

It still hurts, though, when his inbox contains only About.com’s ‘Poem of the Day’, a spam ad about male enhancement the natural way, and a message from Hester.

****

_Castiel,_

_Father forwarded me your email; he’s tied up this week with a major client. He sends his regards._

_Needless to say, he won’t be able to accept your invitation. While I’m sure he recognizes that this play is important to you, since it’s the last you’ll ever be in, none of us can afford to go skittering off to Lawrence on company time. I’m so sorry Castiel, but that’s just the way it is. He adds that, though this is your last one, it’s hardly any different from the others, so there’s no reason to get excessively worked up about it._

_I know how difficult this must be for you, even if Father won’t acknowledge it. You always had more guts than the rest of us. You chased what you wanted in life. I just wish that you’d think now about what’s best for_ you _. You can always be proud of yourself that you gave acting a shot, even if it didn’t exactly work out, so don’t you think it’s time now that you considered how to build a satisfying life for yourself? I worry about you; I worry that you’re not happy where you are. I want you to be happy. We all do._

_Anytime you want to head out here, the company has everything covered: plane ticket expenses, a starting apartment, everything. Heck, it wouldn’t matter if you showed up in Boston tomorrow. Would it be so terrible to stop torturing yourself with this last job and come join us? There’s a place for you here now, whenever you want it. Please, Castiel, think about it._

_Your sister,_

_Hester_

****

Castiel clicks “Reply”, and for some long moments he stares at the blank white rectangle and its blinking cursor. He flips his laptop shut and, without any conscious thought, reaches for the thick book he’d just put the ticket stub in and opens it at random. If the world works the way it should, he reasons, this will be the point when he will light upon just the right passage. Words of wisdom, heavenly intervention from whatever force makes motifs consistent, endings satisfying, and stories make sense. He lets his eyes land at random.

****

_EDWARD:_

_Where is the Duke of Norfolk, gentle Warwick?_

_And when came George from Burgundy to England?_

****

He figures that beggars can’t be choosers.

Curled up on the floor of his half-boxed apartment, Castiel reads _Henry VI, Part III_ until it’s time to go.

 

\------- ---- ---------

 

"You're mad. The table's fucking _dangling off the edge of the stage_ -"

"There's space. Anyway, I want to see the ghost completely straight on, and this is the only way we can do it-"

"I don't care if you want the ghost to do a fucking table dance, the other placement worked fine and didn't endanger the lives of the actors-"

"Balthy, what is it that you do? Because, the last time I checked, I was the _friggin' director_ -"

"Yes you are and you're barking. Shall I call five?"

"No, you shan't tell them to take five, because we are down past the wire and I want this fucking scene fucking RUN!"

Crowley pages through his script with theatrical aggression.  Balthazar makes a face that dearly wishes to roll its eyes but also wishes to avoid further argument. Castiel shifts his weight on the hard wooden bench. He hasn't moved in a while and is feeling rather stiff.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

Chuck is nervous. That in itself wouldn't usually be any great shakes, but this time he's standing in front of a cluster of little kids in matching t-shirts and quaking like a puppy, and, well, that's just damn sad.

Not that Dean isn't pretty nervous, too, but he has good reason. If their luck is any sign, this "curse" shit still hasn't let up. The crackhead dog Ellen ran off the property yesterday made a reappearance, and it took the whole crew to track down a leash and wrestle it around the hellhound's neck. Dean hadn't finished tying the thing to a tree a ways off when he saw a flash from the sound tent. For no real reason some wires and shit caught on fire, and Bobby, genius that he is, decided that it'd be a great idea to dump whiskey on it.

****

\------- ---- -------

****

Balthazar smiles. It's frightening. "Alright, kids, top of three-four.* Go."

The hardest part of being in ensemble, Castiel reflects as Macbeth confers with First Murderer and Second Murderer, is the boredom.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

After they put the fire out, Dean listened to Chuck as he explained that, no, these aren't just any little kids sitting Indian-style on the grass, yes, they're supposed to be running around here during the afternoon run-through, and no, don't throw them all out on their little asses.

Some huge fancy-ass sponsor that Dean hadn't cared enough to remember the name of runs a theater camp for little kids. Personally, Dean thinks it's a really bad idea to bring kids in early to experience the "behind-the-scenes" of the production, because that shit ain't meant for children's eyes. Or ears. A distant strain of English-accented profanity from the stage area backs him up.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

It causes problems, the boredom. Like everyone else who ever took a drama class, Castiel was once told that "acting is reacting". Indeed, his entire job is reacting: chatter or titter or gasp quietly in the background, accordingly, to form a nice human backdrop for the scene. Looking active and reactive, though, in the same scene that goes on for eternity is no easy task. In the quietest and most honest corners of his mind, he believes that he has the hardest job on stage. Because with every other role there's something to _do_ , to keep one in the moment.

He's heard a lot of bitter old actors refer to theater as a "dying art", but even he has to admit that Shakespearean theater can make a person cynical. There's a desperation about it. The same material, dragged across four centuries. Reinvented and re-imagined and made "relevant" every year, and maybe if it's refreshing and inventive and relevant enough this time then maybe, just maybe, someone will do more than _appreciate_ it. The mad, desperate frenzy to convince the world that it isn't just clever old text that you'll like if you're smart enough.

As an actor, you can hope that maybe there's someone out there who understands more than the odd word, who notices your brilliant take on that speech, who hears the unusual scansion of that line, feels the same fervent, childish, worshipful love of these words that you do. Someone who's listening at all, someone who cares.

That's if you're the lead.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

So, Dean built the stupid little cardboard stage at the last minute just for Chuck who decided in an explosion of last-minute neuroses that he wanted a puppet show. A motherfucking _puppet show_. To explain the plot of the play to the kids, he'd said. Dean replied that, yeah, that's what the goddamn play's for, but no dice.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

Castiel sits on his bench, he listens and reacts, and he knows that Messenger Number 3 will strut and fret his hour upon the stage* and no one will be watching. But he will do it regardless. He will do it because he knows that the show couldn't be whole without him. In that quiet and honest place in his mind he knows that a story is more than its leads; it's just as much its Servants, Soldiers, Handmaids, and Messengers 1, 2, and 3.

So Castiel will treasure Messenger Number 3. He will hoard his six words like gold, feel them in his chest and throat, taste them on his tongue, hear their rhythm, and love them dearly. Castiel will react quietly on the sidelines, be the best backdrop that he can be, and then he will go home and say soliloquies to his bathroom mirror, as he always has. He will do it and it will be a pleasure, because he loves the words, every last one of them, with a devout ache in his soul. He will love the words, and it will be enough.

As for what happens after this show closes...He won't think about that.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

Chuck, stuttering and sweating, has one scorched eyebrow.

****

\-------- ---- ---------

****

"His back is to the fucking audience, Crowley! Why can't we just have all the set pieces where we'd decided they'd go?"

"He doesn't sit the whole friggin' time, I've got him open- oh Christ, Michael, for fuck's sake cheat out-"

"Yes, certainly, but someone is still going to fall off the goddamn stage here soon-"

"I can't believe this. I left Stratford for this."

"Bloody Stratford again- you were a stagehand! God, I need coffee. Cassie, love, you're not doing anything, go fetch me some before I disembowel something."

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

"H-Hey, kids! Welcome to Lawrence Shakespeare Festival's _Macbeth_!"

Chuck freezes in horror.

"No- NO WAIT, I didn't mean to say...oh my _God_!"

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

_Well,_ Castiel thinks as he climbs off of the stage, _at least I don't have to sit anymore_.

****

\------- ---- ---------

 

As usual, a lot of stuff happens at once.

When Dean turns to follow Chuck's widened eyes, he sees a big-ass yellow dog galloping toward the group, leash trailing. Kids yelp in surprise, Jo and Ash dive out ninja-style from behind the 'stage', Chuck lets out what can only be described as a shriek, Dean's vision latches onto two shocked blue eyes that belong to an equally shocked man with an empty Styrofoam cup in his hand and a lot of dark liquid down his front, and Sam gallops across the grass with his limbs wheeling everywhere, screaming "BONES, NO!"

Roughly thirty seconds later, Dean, Jo, Ash, Chuck, and Sam stare down at the wreckage. The tiny stage is toast. The Lady Macbeth puppet is missing her head, two of the witches are missing, and Duncan's felt chest is (preemptively) slashed open. The dog has vanished.

All Dean can think to say is “‘Bones’?"

Sam, still panting, shrugs.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

Before Castiel has time to add "moderate to severe bodily burns" to his mental list of work-related injuries over the past twenty four hours, he hears Chuck yell "Hey! Hey, uh..."

Recognizing the unspoken "you!" at the end of that sentence, he enters the cluster of impatient children. Chuck is panicking next to the ruined puppet stage. He turns and announces:

"Hey kids! We're having some, some technical difficulties, so, uh, here's...um..."

"Castiel," he offers.

"Castiel, one of our very own actors! And he's, he's gonna do, um....something from this play! Give us a speech, Castiel."

Chuck looks at him desperately. He feels the strange sensation of his insides vanishing. "I'm ensemble," he says weakly.

Eyes never leaving his small charges, Chuck hisses a frantic whisper into Castiel's ear. "Come on man, help me out."

At his side, the Festival's executive director is sweating heavily. In front of him, thirty bored, judgmental stares pin him to the spot. Somewhere in the distance, Sam is searching in vain for the manic dog. And there at the far right, Dean has a shredded puppet in his hand and an impossible look on his face.

Castiel remembers the empty cup he's holding. He drops it. He breathes in.

 

\------- ---- --------

****

Dean almost kinda wishes he were the praying type right now, just so he could think _Dear God, please don't let this be too much of a train wreck_.

He doesn't have a whole lot of hope as he notices the slight shake in Cas' hands. The rest of Cas, though, seems to have gone into full-blown zen master mode: he drops the inexplicable Styrofoam cup, breathes in, and looks out at nothing with those stupid motherfucking blue eyes.

His arms slacken by his sides, and his face goes blank.

"She should have died hereafter. There would have been time for such a word."

It's so quiet that Dean almost doesn't hear it, but it punches the breath out of his lungs.

"Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day, to the last syllable of recorded time, and all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death."

Cas' voice is melodic, flowing with the poetry. But it’s also flat, somehow. Even.

Exhausted.

"Out. Out, brief candle." For just a second, his eyes slide shut. When they open again, there's something else in them. Something Dean can't put his finger on. "Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard from no more. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury..."

Something _old._

"...signifying nothing."

****

Dean is gonna kick Castiel's ass.

****

There's a long silence that no one has any clue what to do with. Dean watches as Cas snaps back into reality, looking like he just accidentally said something really vulgar in front of his grandma. The kids are still; Chuck, Jo, and Ash wear matching stupid expressions.

Dean starts the goddamned applause. Someone's gotta be in charge around here.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

It occurs to Castiel as he fast-walks with all his might across the grass toward the main stage that he probably should have taken a bow.

"Castiel! Hey, Cas! Dude, for Chrissakes!"

He really should keep walking. But, of course, it's Dean, so Castiel doesn't.

"Hello Dean."

"What the hell, man?"

He feels his head tip to the side in confusion. Whatever he was expecting, that wasn't it.

"What?"

"What the fuckwas that back there?"

Confusion quickly breeds humiliation. Castiel stares at the dirt and feels something bitter rise in his throat. "I'm sorry. I know you love that speech."

"Damn straight I do, and that was the best I've ever seen it."

The unabashed honesty in Dean's voice forces Castiel's eyes up. The impossible look is back in spades, but this time it's so much worse and so much better because it's directed at him. That look is all for him.

"I'm serious, man! Cause you- you got it right!You're not supposed to yell and rage and- and- and _Blue Steel_ for that one, because it's about giving up and running out of stuff to live for and it's...it's tired. And you got it, dude. You really got it." The heartbreaking earnestness doesn't leave his voice even when he snaps: "And if you think for a second that you can't act circles and- and fucking _octagons_ around that dick they chose instead, so help me, I will kick your ass!"

Castiel should walk away right now. He should be sitting up on stage and reacting, not nailing down yet another reason that it will tear him apart to leave. The longer he knows Dean the longer that lists gets, and Castiel doesn't know if he can take it.

"Dean." He plants his feet. "Thank you very much for the compliment, but it is irrelevant as I am not playing, nor will I ever play, Macbeth."

They stare at each other until Dean breaks into a grin.  "You said the M word!" he singsongs. "We’re all fuuuuucked- Cas? Dammit, come back here!"

Castiel doesn't get very far toward the stage, though, before he hears a distant rumbling in the wings. Dreamlike, he watches as the gigantic blond dog crashes through the entrance and onto the stage, barrels toward the edge, and encounters several ankles on the way. Castiel averts his eyes at just the right moment. He doesn't, however, miss the shouts and the thuds, and certainly not the very distinct _crack_ sound.

As the stage area erupts into commotion, Castiel turns slowly to face Dean and finds himself utterly speechless. For a long moment, they do what they're best at: staring at each other.

"Well," Dean says pragmatically, "I feel like we shoulda seen that one coming."

 

\------- ---- ---------

****

Because people aren't already freaked out enough, Ellen calls an ambulance. Like no one in the whole goddamn cast and crew has a car. Anyway, Dean doesn't need a paramedic to tell him that Macbeth and Ross ('Michael' and 'Uriel', apparently) are gonna be laid up for a while.

Chuck is curled up on his folding chair, wearing the blank stare of the single surviving character at the end of a slasher flick. "How bad?" he asks in a deadened voice.

Dean shrugs. He's gotta hear it from somebody. "They'll live. What's-his-face, Uriel, fell pretty bad on his arm, and his ankle's kinda fucked up. Michael's leg got tied up in the damn leash right before he went over, apparently, so...yeah, he's had better days." He sighs. "Sorry, man, but you're out two actors."

Chuck appears to be trying to suffocate himself in his hands. "Including our lead."

"Yeah. Well, hey, he's got an understudy, right?"

"Yes." His voice is muffled. "Uriel."

"Huh?"

"Uriel is Michael's understudy."

"Oh. Well, shit."

"Yeah."

"Shit."

"Yep."

Dean, since he's forgotten every other word in the English language, is about to say "Shit" again when out of his peripheral vision he spots Cas. He's moving quickly and efficiently through the swarm of actors toward the cover of the trees, proving himself to really suck at sneaky escapes.

"Oh no you don't," Dean mutters. He leaves Chuck to have his panic attack in peace.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

Castiel almost makes it to the parking lot. Almost.

"Cas, goddammit! I gotta chase you again?"

"Dean, don't!" He whirls around; the words leave in a vicious bite. "Just don't, okay?"

"Don't what?"

"I know what you're going to say and just don't."

"The lead and his understudy break their everything thirty seconds after I watch you do some of the best damn acting I've ever seen? Shit yeah, you know what I'm gonna say!"

The last five minutes have happened too fast; Castiel longs for a moment alone to think. "This is ridiculous-"

"Yeah it is, it's really fuckin' ridiculous because this kinda stuff doesn't actually happen, shit doesn't just fall into your lap like this, but now it is and, hey, while we're throwing reality out the window, why the hell not, maybe I really did curse the play, I dunno." He flings his arms out in surrender. "I have no fucking clue what's happening. I don't. But this is a good thing!"

"Two men being dragged off the stage by a deranged dog and injuring themselves is a good thing?!"

Dean rolls his eyes impatiently. "For the lova Christ, Cas, this is THEATER! You wanna talk _morals_?"

Castiel is going insane.

"Dude, listen. Yeah, it's a lotta lines, but you're an actor! You love the words, right, this is what you do! I'll help you! We have a few days till opening- shit, I'll run lines with you all night if I have to-"

Whatever expression shows on Castiel's face, it makes Dean stop mid-sentence with his jaw hanging.

"Fuck. You know 'em all already, don't you?"

"Not..." He pulls at his collar. "Not all of them...."

Dean just stares at him.

"Its...It's not about the lines, Dean! How could I ever prepare to do the role justice in _three days_?"

"That's tons of time!" Dean's earnestness is overwhelming. "I know how it works around here, and you're right, shit's gonna get crazy, fast, and it's gonna be a whole lotta blocking* and run-throughs and stuff with no time for actor-y shit. But if you want help, if you want...someone to pay attention, I'll do it. I'm no director, Cas, but I'm a damn good audience, and this is batshit insane but I'll do whatever I have to for you to pull this off."

"Why?" Castiel feels very rude, but he can't understand. Dean met him yesterday. He's just the guy who got in the way of Sam's pile of quarter staffs. He can't understand why Dean cares.

Dean shrugs. "I dunno." His grin is the picture of nonchalance. "Guess I wanna hear that speech again."

"I..." Castiel begins lamely. "Dean, I can't."

"Why the hell not?"

If Castiel were a character in a play, he'd have the words for this. He'd know the right way to explain that it's cruel, the situation Dean's putting him in. This last show was meant to get it all out of Castiel's system: one last run before curtain. It'd leave him underwhelmed but satisfied, and he could finally leave. He'd scrub the mic tape marks from the back of his neck and do something useful with himself. He imagines his brothers calling on occasion, Father looking him in the face at holidays. Feeling like he has someone on his side.

But now here's Dean, Dean like a rugged, smirking hero from an old movie but really not, wearing an expression that Castiel won't read, offering him everything he shouldn't want. He has no idea what to say.

"I can't."

Dean's intensity ebbs away. As his body relaxes, his mouth settles into a flat line. It takes Castiel a moment to recognize the foreign emotion on his face.

Dean is disappointed.

"Well," he says gruffly. "That's just real fuckin' sad."

It's not until Dean's back has retreated several yards that the very last vestiges of Castiel's sanity slip away from him.

"Dean. Dean!"

He turns around and watches Castiel, waiting.

"You said you'd..." He hesitates. "You'll help me?"

Dean grins impossible in Castiel's direction.

 

The paramedics have gone, but the main stage area is still chaos, the grass trampled flat. A massive crowd has formed out of nowhere: Chuck confers with a few intimidating-looking men in ties, the actors stand in restless clusters, Missouri is having a remarkably animated phone conversation, and sound people perch on the edge of the stage smoking cigarettes. Crowley's voice is audible from the tech tent:

"No, I didn't get an understudy for the understudy, do you know why? Because there are exactly six actors in the _entire bloody state of Kansas!_  Why did I ever leave Stratford? WHY?"

Castiel, fearing for his life, decides against trying to speak to the director. Eventually he tracks down the stage manager instead, who is leaning against the far edge of the stage and typing frantically on his smart phone.

If he notices Castiel standing in front of him exuding nervous energy, he doesn't show it.

"Um. Balthazar."

"Cassie," he mumbles vaguely into the keyboard.

"I can do it."

"Do what."

"The role. I can play it."

He looks up, quirks an eyebrow. "Can you, now?"

"Yes."

"And you're not fucking with me?"

"No."

Returning his focus to his phone, he sounds bored as he says "Alright, lovely, now go talk to Rufus about four-eight, can't have you goring Luc's eyes out."

"I...what?"

"Your fight, dearest, go talk to Rufus about the blocking for your fight. Act four scene eight. Tonight's preview is canceled, obviously, we might as well get something accomplished." He waves his hand in a fretful shooing gesture. "Off you go."

Castiel gapes. "Wait, I have the part?"

When Balthazar glances up again, it's to give him a look of utter bewilderment. "Would you like a bloody plaque? Run along, I've a schedule to demolish."

As Castiel walks off to find the fight choreographer, his hysteria makes way for a strange, unsettling calm.

****

That night when he drives home, Dire Straits is on the radio.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

Dean lurks outside of Cas' building for a pretty long time before it dawns on him that he's lurking. Probably should have gotten his number. He discards that idea right away though, because that would require _asking for his number_ and then he really wants to punch his own brain in the face because no seriously when did he turn into a thirteen year old?

So he's totally not prepared when, thirty seconds later, Cas walks around the side of the building quietly singing that one dumb Dire Straits song to himself and yeah, Cas was right when he said he can't sing.

His face is pretty priceless when he sees he's busted, though.

"Hello Dean." All dignified. Of course.

"Hi."

"What can I do for you?"

For a second, Dean's confused. "I thought that'd we were gonna, uh, run lines? Or were you..."

In Dean's long history of being dumb as a box of inebriated rocks, this moment might be the most impressive.

"Oh. God." Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck. "Uh, sorry, turns out I'm even more of a creepy motherfucker than I gave myself credit for, so, uh, I'll see ya later--"

"Dean, wait."

He stops running his ass back to his car like a tool and looks at Cas. Dean still isn't great at reading his expressions (Jesus Christ, has he only known him for a day?), but he doesn't think Cas looks creeped out at all. Kind of the opposite, maybe.

"I hadn't understood that you'd meant tonight, but I would be happy to have your help. In light of our limited time, it seems best to start as soon as possible. If that's okay with you."

"'Okay'?" Dean grins. "Dude, I'm the guy who stalked you to your place like the creepy bastard I am; it's totally okay with me."

Cas smiles. "I hope you know how much I appreciate this, Dean. It means a lot."

Dean clears his throat, nods. "Yeah, no problem man. Shall we?" He turns to the door, Cas following.

Neither says anything until they enter the elevator. "By the way, that was some great singing. Now I'm really pissed I missed Cabaret."

"Not funny."

Silence. Then, under his breath:

"Willkommen, bienvenuuue, welcooome-"

"Not FUNNY, Dean."

 

\------ ---- ---------

****

They start out standing across from each other in the tiny apartment. Cas holds his script limply at his side, like he's daring himself to not need it; with every quick peek he pulls a just-brought-dishonor-upon-my-whole-family-and-our-cow face. Meanwhile, Dean reads out the other characters' dialogue from one of Cas' several gigantic _Complete Works_ ("That one has better notes, but Crowley insists on the Folio.").

Fifteen minutes later, Dean grits his teeth and ignores the persistent ache in his arms. He is Dean Fucking Winchester. Ten thousand pound nerd Bibles are no match for his manly ripped-ness. Especially not in front of Cas.

Cas takes pity on him, digs out an old Folger paperback*, and they trudge on.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

MACBETH: So foul and fair a day I have not seen.

 

BANQUO: What are these, so wither'd and so wild in their attire, that look not like the inhabitants o' the earth, and yet are on't? You seem to understand me, by each once her chappy finger laying upon her skinny lips: you should be women, and yet your beards forbid me to interpret that you are so. ...Well fuck, Banquo. Don't sugarcoat it.

****

MACBETH: I believe we cut that line.

****

BANQUO: Yeah?

****

MACBETH: Crowley decided on a more...seductive interpretation of the witches.

****

BANQUO: Like, sexy witches? Sweet.

****

MACBETH: Anna, Bela, and Ruby are all very attractive.

****

BANQUO: You think? I dunno, man, Ruby and Bela scare the shit outta me. And Anna's kinda....I dunno, redheads, y'know. They're, uh. You think so?

****

MACBETH: Objectively? Certainly.

****

BANQUO: But you don't think they're, y'know, sexy?

****

MACBETH: Well. I, um. I wouldn't.

****

BANQUO: Huh?

****

MACBETH: Dean. I’m in theater.

****

BANQUO: Oh. _Oh_. Great! I mean, uh- Cool.

****

MACBETH: I like Anna very much, though. She was a good friend of mine since high school.

****

BANQUO: "Was"?

****

MACBETH: We haven't spoken much lately.

****

BANQUO: Yeah?

****

MACBETH: Yeah. I don't speak to anyone much anymore, really.

****

BANQUO: Why?

****

MACBETH: Speak, if you can: what are you?

****

\------- ---- ----------

 

An hour later, Dean stands on Cas' coffee table, yelling about geese.

****

"'Geese, villain!' What the fuck kinda response is that? The messenger guy comes to tell him about the shit-ton of soldiers outside his castle, and he-"

"Dean, how are you still fixated on this?" Cas is pacing frustrated circles into the carpet. "It's a few lines-"

"It's a few lines that are damn important! You can't just gloss over 'em for some cheap comedy, we see what an evil fucker this guy is-"

"We see Macbeth's evil in 'Geese, villain'?!"

Dean waves a frantic hand at the text. The coffee table makes a suspicious creaking sound. "'The devil damn thee black', 'Go prick thy face', 'death of thy soul'! The kid's just sendin' a message and he gets an earful- this asshole tortures everybody he comes in contact with, cause he's merciless! He's nothin' but evil."

"Dean, the whole point of the play is that Macbeth isn't evil, not completely!" Cas stops pacing. His eyes are doing that blazing thing again. Dean’s having trouble doing that concentrating thing. Again. "At the beginning he's righteous, a respected soldier,” Cas declares, “and even when his ambition starts to overtake him we can still imagine that he never expected it to go as far as it did-"

“Dude, he betrayed his whole country! His friends!"

"It's irrelevant, Dean!" Cas storms up onto Dean's level to stare into his face. The table quakes. There’s something very naturally scary about Cas, Dean notes absently. "The whole point is that Macbeth is corrupted by pride, by power, but he is still a man. There is still humanity in him!" They're nose-to-nose now, voices crescendoing. "And that's what we're seeing in this scene: when he finally cracks, when it all starts caving in on him and he's trapped! That's the heart of this play, that's why from every human perspective you'd call it tragedy!"

"Then PLAY it!" Dean roars.

"What?"

"The cracking, the caving in, the fear! The freakin' TRAGEDY!” he screams. Distantly, Dean realizes that he’s losing it. “Give me something with those lines!"

That does it. Cas stomps his foot, the coffee table holds on for dear life, his face contorts with a wild yell of “DEATH OF THY SOUL!"

Dean throws that energy right back, thrusting out his arms in the universal sign of _come at me bro_. "YEAH?"

"THOSE LINEN CHEEKS OF THINE ARE COUNSELLORS TO FEAR!"

"DAMN _STRAIGHT_!"

With a defeated crack, the table collapses under their feet.

 

\------- ---- ---------

****

The next day, Wednesday, is an emergency all-day rehearsal. It's pushing a hundred degrees and sunny. Three mics crap out, Crowley spills tea all over his annotated script, and Sam accidentally insinuates that Jo looks like an Alsatian.

Castiel misses three cues while staring at Dean. Dean walks directly into two set pieces and the prop mistress while staring at Castiel.

The show will open on Saturday.

 

\------- ---- ---------

****

Around one o’clock Lady Macduff passes out from heat exhaustion, so Crowley calls lunch break.

The cast and crew splinter off into clumps. Actors pile into Meg’s car, some sound guys walk off to the nearby Subway, and stagehands sprawl on the grass by the tech tent.

Castiel is settling alone under a tree with a protein bar when a voice behind him makes him choke:

“Hey, mind if I sit here?”

He looks up into the ever-apologetic face of Sam Winchester. “Oh God, sorry, didn’t mean to startle you!”

“No, no it’s fine Sam.” he says around a cough. He gestures to the space beside him. “Please.”

“I’m really sorry about yesterday.” Sam sits and holds out half of a sandwich. “Here, consider it a peace offering.”

“It was an accident, there’s really no need-”

“Come on dude, I nearly smashed your head open! The least I can do is give you some real lunch.” He nods at Castiel’s half-eaten protein bar. “No way that’s enough for a guy in your position.”

Castiel smiles and accepts the offered turkey on rye. “Thank you.” Sam looks pleased. He’s broad-shouldered and much taller than him, but Castiel starts to see the ‘little brother’ in Sam; there’s something undeniably puppyish about the boy. “Dean says you go to law school?”

“Yeah, I’ll be a senior at Stanford,” he answers happily. “It’s great, it’s what I’ve always wanted to do.”

“You have no aspirations to become a professional stagehand, then?”

Sam grins. “Nah, can’t say I do. Always look forward to the Festival, though. Had some really great summers here in high school; I’m glad to be back.” His smile is nostalgic. “Dean and me have been coming down here since Chuck and Bobby started up. They’re family friends. ’Course they let Dean help right away, but I had to wait until I was big enough to climb up onto the stage by myself.”  

“Dean certainly seems to have a, uh, presence here.”

A laugh bursts from Sam, and it’s light and genuine. “That’s for sure. His job title doesn’t say much, but he runs the show back there.” He jerks his head toward the empty stage. “Even if it is just a summer gig, the guy’s been doing it since he was eighteen. He’d never admit it, but he loves it around here.”

“He seems to have a gift.”

“Yeah, he does. I was always encouraging him to pursue it, but he, uh, he decided that he should take over Dad’s old business when...a few years back.” Sam takes a bite of his sandwich.

“Pursue ‘it’?” Castiel asks, confused.

“Yeah.” Sam raises his eyebrows in a clear expression of _Duh_. “Directing.”

“Dean...Dean was a director?”

“Well, he...” Now Sam’s the one who’s confused. “He didn’t tell you?”

“He’s been giving me some help, some coaching, I suppose, but...no. He hasn’t told me anything.”

Sam takes a breath. It’s the deep breath of someone with a long story to tell and no idea how to go about telling it.

“Some years back, before I went to school, before Dad died, Dean used to take courses at the community college, directing courses. I don’t know a whole lot about it, but he was good. I mean, _good_. He only had one real job that I know of, but it, um...”

Sam shakes his head. “I’ve never seen anything like it. It was a volunteer job with high school kids, a scholarship kinda thing. None of them had ever acted before, half of them didn’t want to be there, their schools made ’em go, but man, what Dean got out of them at the end of those weeks...it was incredible. He changed lives there, I’m sure of it.” His words flood together in eagerness, and Castiel can see his desperation to give his brother the review he deserves. “It was amazing, really honestly _amazing_ , and, y’know, we’ve barely spoken in years but when I think back on it and remember that he gave it up, that he’ll never do it again, it breaks my heart, man. It breaks my heart.”

Sam pauses for breath and looks sheepish after his outburst, but when he looks at Castiel’s face something there makes him continue. “I don’t think he gets how special he is, y’know? Not everybody has that thing that they were born to do, the way he does. And he threw it away, for the crappy old family business! I’ve tried to tell him that the way to respect Dad’s memory isn’t to try to _be_ Dad, but he won’t listen!”

As Castiel watches Sam pulling his fingers through his hair in agitation, a gesture that is achingly reminiscent of Dean, it dawns on him that this is probably the first time Sam has ever gotten to share his feelings about this, even if it is only to a near stranger. He feels a pang of sympathy for the boy. All the grief of their father’s death and the brothers’ parting, he realizes, had its own effect on the younger Winchester. “Dean was upset with you when you went to school?” he asks quietly.

Sam gives a short, rueful laugh. “Furious. He kept saying that I was ‘betraying Dad’s memory’, leaving the family business and stuff, but I don’t think that’s what it was, really. I mean, not all of it, anyway.” He picks absently at the crust of his sandwich.

“I think he was mad I was leaving. He thinks...The way Dean sees it, I think, everyone in his life has left him. Mom, when we were kids, and then Dad, when he checked out early. I think seeing me go was kinda, like, the last straw, y’know? The worst part is that I don’t think he’s even mad about it, about everybody leaving. I think...” Sam’s voice is small. “I think he blames himself. I don’t know why he would. But I really think so.”

Castiel doesn’t know what to say. He feels overwhelmed; it’s been barely two days, and already the brothers’ story reaches him on a level he can’t explain.

And then there’s Dean. Forty-eight hours, give or take, and Castiel’s vicious little crush on a beautiful green-eyed stagehand has evolved into something consuming, something that leaves him feeling lost and nauseous and ecstatic just talking about him. And whatever that something is, it’s brought him here, sitting in the grass with a comforting hand on a gigantic little brother’s shoulder when Castiel very resolutely _doesn’t make friends._ Castiel is leaving in a month, he avoids the friends he already has in the hopes of making it a little easier to leave them. Yet, here he is.

He shares a friendly silence with Sam, offering wordless comfort, and thinks _Dean, what have you done to me?_

Balthazar’s voice from the sound tent breaks the moment, calling everyone back to work. Castiel remembers the half sandwich in his hand and scarfs down a few bites, if only to avoid insulting Sam’s peace offering.

“Hey, um...”

Sam is standing, hands in his pocket. He looks sheepish again. “Thanks for listening.”

Castiel smiles wide. “It’s my pleasure, Sam.”

 

\------- ---- ---------

****

MACBETH: If we should fail?

****

LADY MACBETH: We fail! But screw your courage to the sticking place...ahahaa, she totally just told him to shove it up his ass. Y'know, I always liked her.

****

MACBETH: Dean.

****

LADY MACBETH: Sorry. Screw your courage to the sticking place, and we'll -haaah- okay sorry, sorry...

****

\------- ---- --------

****

On Thursday it rains. One of Sam's shoes is sucked up by a particularly aggressive mud puddle.

The downpour glues Dean’s shirt to his skin. Castiel is mysteriously distracted.

The show will open in two days.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

MACBETH: Which of you have done this?

****

LENNOX: What, my good lord?

****

MACBETH: Thou canst not say I did it. Never shake thy gory locks at me!

****

LENNOX: Okay, why'd Macbeth say that?

****

MACBETH: For god’s sake, Dean...

****

LENNOX: I'm serious, man! 'Cause right now all I'm gettin' out of you is 'Aaaah, scary ghost!'.

****

MACBETH: That's because there _is_ a scary ghost, Dean!

****

LENNOX: Nonono, dude, think about it! This is the guy who kicks ass in battle and hangs out with witches, and he chooses right now to have his _Cuckoo's Nest_ moment? At dinner with all of his courtiers and shit? Why is he so freaked RIGHT NOW?

****

MACBETH: There's a ghost bleeding on the fine linen.

****

LENNOX: Whose ghost, Cas, _whose?!_

****

MACBETH: Banquo's, I...Dean, I don't see where you're going with this.

****

LENNOX: Is there actually a ghost in that chair? Or is he just nuts?

****

MACBETH: I...I don't know, it-

****

LENNOX: What the fuck, man, you gotta KNOW this shit!

****

MACBETH: Okay, okay! ....Well, no one else but Macbeth sees it, and usually in Shakespeare ghosts are visible to everyone, like in _Hamlet_ when-

****

LENNOX: When everybody and their mom sees the ghost, yeah. So?

****

MACBETH: So Macbeth's hallucinating, he's hallucinating because he's guilty, the guilt is so intense that he loses his mind, because...

****

LENNOX: Because?

****

MACBETH: ....his best friend.

****

LENNOX: That's m'boy!

****

MACBETH: He's not scared of the ghost....He's grieving for his friend. Killing innocents didn't shake him, but betraying his friend... that's what cracked him, it made him-

****

LENNOX: Good morning, Nurse Ratched.

****

MACBETH: What?

****

LENNOX: Nothin', Cas. What is't that moves your highness?

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

Four hours, three overturned chairs, two thermoses of Castiel's preferred brand of voice-repairing honeyed tea, and hundreds of lines of iambic pentameter later, Dean calls a break. They collapse onto Castiel's spongy Ikea couch to split a pizza. Castiel feels a sense of incredibly pleasant bewilderment. How he ended up here: sitting in his half-packed up apartment sharing a comfortable silence with Dean, remarkable, vibrant Dean, he has no idea. Regardless, he's happier than he has been in months.

How strangely time behaves when one is ridiculously happy, he thinks. He tries to remember what he's done for the last several months, but doesn't come up with much. Worked at a Best Buy. Took some unsatisfying roles. Attempted and failed an online business class. Ignored calls from Gabriel and Anna, tried to cut his ties while he still could. It takes up a week's space in his mind.

But the past four days with Dean...Well, that could have been years.

"Why did you only get ensemble parts?" Dean asks.

Castiel is caught off guard. "What?"

"It doesn't make any sense. You're an awesome actor- don't you argue or I'll take that goddamn thermos and stick it where the sun don't shine- so how the hell do you keep getting the sucky roles?"

"I've been told that I don't, uh, audition well."

"The fuck, Cas?"

"I don't know." He exhales. "I guess I get nervous. It took me years to work up the nerve to even audition for the Festival; I finally went for it this year because it was my last chance.”

They chew in silence.

"Dean, I want to tell you how grateful I am for your help."

"Hey now, don't start with that shit."

"I mean it. I would never have dreamt of undertaking this if it weren't for you."

"S'good to hear. I know I'm no director-"

"No, but that's what I'm saying: have you ever thought about it? Directing?"

"I'm thinking about that pepperoncini, if you're not gonna take it."

"I'm serious."

"So am I, dude, those things are freakin' delicious."

"I know a good director when I see one, Dean. I've worked with a few."

Dean sighs around his pepperoncini. "I kinda messed around with it for a little bit, thought it'd...be something I might wanna do. But I'm good where I am now. I got the shop, and I got summers with you clowns." His grin doesn't reach his eyes.

"I just mean that...What you do backstage is amazing."

"Thanks. I think my official title is 'House Manager', but really I'm just King of the Grunt Crew." Another grin thrown Castiel's way. "Works for me."

"You have more creative vision than you give yourself credit for. That leadership, if you put that on the stage instead of behind it... You're wasted as a stagehand, Dean."

Instantly, Dean’s relaxed tone and body language snap. "What, like you're living up to all your hopes and dreams playing Gutless Sap Number 27 for the rest of your life?" he barks. "I know what I am, Cas. I fix stuff and move stuff and boss the crew kids around. That's it."

A moment later, Dean relaxes again. "But, y'know, at least you got all that crap about Boston out of your head."

Castiel has no idea what to say, so he says nothing.

"Cas. Cas, you did ditch that plan, right?"

"I'm sorry, Dean."

"What the fuck, man?! And _I'm_ a waste?" Dean jerks to his feet and paces across the room. "What, so all of, all of this," He gestures vaguely at the room and its creative disarray, the smashed remnants of the coffee table. "It didn't change anything?"

"You know who you are, Dean. I wish I had that luxury."

They stare at each other.

"I sent an email to my father, telling him I have the lead," Castiel says. "He never watched me act, even when I was young, not once...If he'd come out to see it, just one night, well, maybe...”

“An email.” Dean scoffs, and it’s a bitter sound. “You’re letting your whole life hang off of an email-”

“It’s, it’s more complicated than that-”

“An EMAIL, man!”

"And even after I leave, I would never say that these few days weren't something!” Castiel blurts out. _Oh crap_ drifts lucidly across his consciousness, but it’s too late to take it back now. His gaze is steady as he says “Never, Dean."

Dean stands with his hands on his hips, biting at his bottom lip. He says nothing, just stares at Castiel with a look that might be disbelief.

"Would you?" Castiel prompts.

Dean turns away, runs his hand over his face, and breathes. "Nah I wouldn't, Cas.” It sounds like it’s meant more for himself than for Castiel. “I wouldn't."

He sits back down and grabs another slice of pizza. Gradually the silence loses its tension, shifting back toward the comfort it'd had before.

Until Castiel ruins it.

"How did your father die?"

He wishes dearly that he could sink into his squishy from-the-box couch and never be seen again.

"I'm sorry, I don't know where that-"

"Nah, it's no big deal. He, uh, he shot himself a couple years back."

Castiel is shocked. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be, we never talked anyway." Dean waves it off and plays with the edge of his napkin. "See, my mom, she died in a house fire when Sammy was a baby so Dad'd been kinda whacked out for pretty much our whole lives. I dunno, though, I guess I just..." When Dean looks up his eyes are unfocused. "I guess I just always hoped that he'd snap out of it." A moment passes, and he ducks his head again. "Sammy got the hell outta dodge pretty fast after that. Law school, and whatnot."

Castiel wants to comfort Dean. He wants to tell him that he shouldn't blame himself, and that his selfless love for his brother is one of the most incredible things Castiel has ever seen. He wants to say that Dean’s hatred of himself is its own contained tragedy, and that Castiel’s sure that years from now when he’s suffocating in a spacious office in New England he still won’t have forgotten the way a green-eyed stranger stitched his face back together with gentle hands when he surely had more important things to be doing.

He can tell, though, that Dean doesn't want to hear these things. So he says:

"Want to run Macduff's fight?"

"Yes."

 

\------- ---- ---------

****

On Friday, some lights scaffolding spontaneously combusts, Meg loses her voice in the middle of the sleepwalking scene, someone finds a wasp's nest under the banquet table, and Sam, standing under a tree, is shocked when a squirrel slips from a branch above, falls, and lands on his head. Chuck goes to lie down.

Dean realizes that he still doesn’t have Cas’ phone number.

There are twenty-four hours left until opening.

****

\------- ---- ----------

****

Dean, for all of his natural gifts, doesn't understand scansion.

"Cas, we open tomorrow. If you're still not satisfied with this speech, how the hell is drumming out that iambic crap for the nineteenth time gonna change anything?"

Castiel, who has been softly tapping the rhythm of the same line against his thigh for the past fifteen minutes, shoots him a scornful look.  "It isn't crap, Dean! When I'm stuck, I go back to the basic mechanics of the meter*- everything I need as an actor is laid out in the poetry itself!"

Dean snorts. "Yeah yeah yeah. 'Shakespeare gives you all the tools you need', blah blah, bullshit. No one cares how pretty it sounds, the words are there to say something." He rolls his eyes. "Not like half the audience has a clue what they're saying anyway, but that's Shakespeare for ya."

"Dean!” Castiel groans to himself. “God, am I teaching poetry to fish here?!”

Castiel sees the _Here we go_... expression on Dean's face. He doesn't care in the slightest.

“Do you listen to Led Zeppelin because it’s pretty?” he asks.

“Cas, I don’t know why you keep trying to convince me that Robert Plant is secretly William Shakespeare, cause it ain’t gonna work. I’d like to see ole Bill pull off leather pants halfas well as- actually, nevermind, I _really_ don’t wanna see that-”

"DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND?!”

Castiel has a moment of clarity in which he realizes that he is standing in his destroyed  apartment with a near stranger whose sole connection to Castiel is the death-by-wooden-pole his little brother nearly doled out, exploding with righteous fury over iambic pentameter.

 _This is my life_ , he thinks.

He considers.

 _I like it_.

“It's not about how pretty it is; the way it sounds IS what it says! The rhythm of the poetry, this rhythm-" He reaches down for the table and keeps tapping, louder:

_ba BUM, ba BUM, ba BUM, ba BUM, ba BUM-_

"It mimics a heartbeat, breathing- the first sounds every human being hears in its existence. And when a character's emotions are expressed through a break in that rhythm-"

_BUM BUM, ba BUM, ba BUM-_

"We don't just hear it. We feel it.”

As he rambles on about what he loves most, Castiel's chest swells with something hot and painful and wonderful. This, this is like breathing. It’s getting lost in a foreign city with your best friend, falling in love and falling on your face and getting punched in the ribs, a shot of vodka on an empty stomach; it’s fast cars and sharp smiles and Led Zeppelin.

If he can just make Dean understand this about him, then Dean'll know everything and maybe Castiel will be satisfied then, or maybe not, maybe it'll just make it worse, bind one hot, nauseating passion with another and make it impossible for him to ever, ever leave, to do what he must, but Dean’s still listening and he’s still talking-

"They stop being lines on the page and they live inside of us, like a heartbeat; the words become flesh and blood as soon as an actor speaks them, no matter if the audience has a damn clue what they're saying! They don't need to! Because it's physical, these words, you can feel them, you can taste them-"

-and he dearly wishes he would stop talking, he needs to stop talking, because he can't do this, it'll just break him so he must _stop talking_ -

-and Dean seizes him by the face and kisses him.

Distantly, he thinks _That works_.

All of the breath in Castiel's body leaves him in a surprised _mmph_ , muffled against Dean's soft but determined lips. He over-balances, starts to tip over, and reaches out to fist his hands into the front of Dean's shirt. Their bodies press against each other. Castiel emits another unflattering sound as he pulls in a gulp of breath from Dean’s mouth, who in turn responds with a low growl, and Castiel loses all higher brain function for a moment. Thankfully, Dean is focused enough for both of them: he knots his fingers into Castiel’s hair, coaxing his lips apart with slow strokes of his tongue.

Castiel’s hands slide effortlessly around Dean's sides to clutch at his back, and his solid form feels natural in his arms. Dean's hands move to frame his face and guide the subtle synchronization of their mouths as they find a rhythm of their own; they feel it pulse warmly between them. And maybe Castiel's imaging it, like the stupid cheesy Elizabethan romantic he just can’t help being, but he could swear he feels Dean's heartbeat tapping along, or maybe it's his own, or both, in unison...

Castiel pulls back far enough to mutter against Dean's lips: "Okay, I'll shut up."

Dean lets out a laugh, Castiel yanks him in by the collar and swallows it. He feels his back hit the wall of the short hallway to his bedroom and bathroom, feels Dean press up against him, whose hands are indecisive and fumbling but nevertheless enthusiastic. Castiel’s heart is in his ears and his guts are burning and his brain is caught in a hysterical loop of _This is happening this is happening this is actually happening_ -

His internal monologue screams in protest as he snakes his hands up to Dean’s shoulders and pushes a few inches of space between them. “Wait a minute,” he gasps. And it sucks because all he wants is to be kissing him again, and it’s not like Dean hasn’t been there in spirit for every one of his morning showers since he met him, but the fact remains that- “I met you five days ago.”

Dean is panting, the freckled skin across his cheeks flushed, and his eyes are more than a little wild. “Yeah, you did, and I’m not gonna lie Cas, I’ve wanted this the whole damn time.”

“Okay good,” Castiel mutters before pulling them together again.

Tripping over each other and knocking into walls, toeing off shoes and yanking off shirts, they eventually make it to the bedroom, where Dean’s enthusiasm topples them backwards onto the mattress in a tangle.

Castiel loves words. But, he decides as he tips his head back and exposes his throat for Dean’s wandering mouth, he’s had quite enough of them for tonight.

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

It's much, much later when Dean mutters, half-asleep into an anarchic mess of dark hair, "Yeah, I get it now."

Castiel opens an eye. He sees nothing but the warm skin of Dean's chest. "Get what?"

"Scansion."

Castiel, who feels at once glacially calm and giddy with joy, asks "Are you saying that I make iambic pentameter sexy?"

Dean rolls over underneath the sheets, places his forearms on either side of Castiel, and props himself up. He hovers a few inches above Castiel’s body and grins in the semi-darkness.

"You make most things sexy."

****

\------- ---- ---------

****

Waking up curled into Dean's side is far and away one of the best things to happen to Castiel in quite a while.

Being careful not to rouse him, Castiel checks the clock on the nightstand. One in the afternoon. He winces. Apparently, a few days' chaos reduces him to the sleep schedule he had when he was sixteen. What time did they go to sleep last night? (Or, a giddy teenage voice inside him corrects, not go to sleep?) Good thing call* isn't until five.

That's when he's smacked across the face with the fact that the play opens in seven hours.

Castiel feels ready to implode in upon himself. Too much is swirling around in his mind right now, too many emotions fighting for dominance. Panic. What does he think he's doing, getting onstage in front of a couple thousand people and playing one of the greatest roles of all time after three days' preparation? Worry. Even if he does survive this, what happens after a month when he has to leave it all? Stupid, lovestruck schoolboy bliss. Dean Winchester is sleeping soundly in his bed, one bare, rebellious leg stuck out from under the twisted pile of sheets.

Eventually, the last one wins.

Castiel showers, dresses, and sets about making coffee at the kitchenette. As his mind wanders, his imagination gets away from him. What will happen in a few minutes when Dean wakes? Maybe they'll lean side-by-side on the counter and eat dry toast and run lines (Chat? Bicker over line readings? Make out against the dishwasher?).

Maybe they'll forget the blind panic of the impending opening night and spend the remainder of the afternoon doing nothing important, wasting time (Watching bad TV? Talking about their families? Making out on the crappy Ikea couch?), and then maybe they'll take Dean's dangerous-looking car to the Festival to make their five o'clock call together (His imagination seems to like that word a lot. Together, together...) and then two hours later the show will begin and maybe everything will go perfectly, he'll say the beautiful words and maybe it'll all be wonderful...maybe, maybe...

He shakes himself. That's all irrelevant for now. For now, he’ll kill time until 'maybe' comes around.

Castiel sits himself down on the couch, opens his laptop, and checks his email.

****

\------- ---- ----------

****

When Dean opens his eyes, a few things happen.

First, he freaks out. Waking up in somebody else's bed is always bad news. Awkward I-got-a-work-thing-s and I'll-call-you-s that both of you know are bullcrap but you do anyway, trying to find that one sock that you flung off to Narnia or some shit- the whole thing just isn't his style. He clears out before sunrise if he can.

Then he remembers that this is Cas' bed, and oh okay crisis averted we're good.

Then he freaks out again a little, because what the _fuck_. That sort of thing- that's _definitely_ not his style.

Then he inhales and the pillowcase smells like Cas and something wiggly and stupid happens in his stomach, and this is getting fucking ridiculous. He goes to shower.

As he stands under the hot water, Dean tries to make up his mind. This kind of thing. It's not his gig. Coupley crap, it doesn't work out for him. Never does. But, hey, the guy's leaving in a few weeks anyway, so what's the problem? A few weeks, he can deal with that without fucking it up, right? But then he gets that stupid feeling again, except this time it just makes him feel like crap, because he's leaving. Cas is leaving. Of course he is. Everybody leaves. Just Dean's luck.

Dean makes up his mind. Right now, he's just gonna do whatever he feels like. And right now, he feels like hanging out with Cas.

Dean grabs his jeans from the floor, yanks them on, doesn't bother finding his shirt because screw you he doesn't feel like it, and heads out into the main room. He rubs a towel over his hair with fuck-it-all face engaged. Cas is sitting on the floor on the other side of the couch, his head ducked. Dean leans against the door frame and smiles.

"Heya Cas."

His head snaps up. His stupid fucking blue eyes are wide and his lips are parted. It takes Dean a second to recognize that look, but he does.

It's the same look Sammy had when he nearly decapitated Cas with a quarterstaff eighty thousand years ago.

It takes Dean a moment to notice the crammed duffel bag on the floor, but he does.

Dean cracks a dumb joke, because that's just how it works.

"That bad? Weird, feedback's usually pretty positive."

"Dean..."

"Runnin’ away from home?”

"I'm..."

"This is the part where you talk."

“I...I got a flight. To Boston.”

“Boston.”

“Yes, it’s where my-”

“Yeah, I fucking remember about fucking Boston. Where the hell is this coming from, man?”

“It....”

Dean catches Cas’ glimpse toward his laptop, where his email inbox is still pulled up. He puts two and two together.

“Oh. Daddy declined your invitation.”

“Dean...”

“Yeah, I get it. He won’t apologize for being a dick when you were a kid, so now you gotta dump your whole life. Well hey, maybe now he’ll put your pictures on the fridge.”

“Dean, I-”

“No, no man, it’s cool. We’re good. I get it. Oh, I fucking get it.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I don’t think you are, else you wouldn’t be walkin’ out, would you? Walkin’ out, they’re always walkin’ out-”

“What else can I do? I shouldn’t be here, I don’t-”

“‘Shouldn’t be here’?! Your soliloquy made me cry, you asshole!”

“It’s-it’s a fluke, I know, I know what I’m capable of, and this is not-”

“If you say this ‘isn’t where I belong’ I will kick your ass into the 16th century!”

“But it-”

“‘Not where I belong’? Jesus, can’t a man scream at another man he just spent all night having awesome sex with without everything getting so fucking _gay?!_ ”

“I’m sorry, you must believe-”

“I don’t ‘must’ believe anything, Cas, not when you’re pulling this shit! I can’t- I can’t fucking believe this! The play? The one you’ve been drooling over since you were like twelve? Suddenly you don’t give a shit? What am I gonna tell Chuck, huh? This isn’t how it works, you can’t just up and LEAVE before you’re forced to be an actual human being for once!”

“Dean-”

“I forgot, though, you aren’t actually a person, you just play one on TV, ain’t that right?”

“That’s n-”

“Daddy hands you your role and you fucking play it, huh?”

“I’d expect you to understand.”

“.....What did you say to me?”

“Why aren’t you a director, Dean?”

“....You....You son of a bitch-”

“Your father’s dead. Your brother’s moved on. Why can’t you?”

“You...say... _one more word_ about my dad, and I will-”

“You would only prove me right, my friend.”

Cas sounds incredibly sad.

“I am...I am sorry, Dean. More than I can possibly say.”

Cas is staring down at his hands. Dean grabs his shirt from the floor, yanks it on, and heads for the door.

“You get to tell Chuck.” He presses his forehead into the cool wood of the door. “Pull an Ingrid Bergman if you want, but that one’s on you.”

The door is open and Dean has the perfect dramatic exit laid out all nice for him, but he catches sight of Cas’ face and he can’t do it. It’s not a kicked-puppy face. It’s worse. It’s the face of a puppy who’s been kicked, knows it deserved it, and is asking to be kicked again.

Dean shakes his head, and he almost feels like laughing. “Dude...How long are you gonna play ensemble in your own life?”

He leaves, and the drive home is quiet.

****

\---- --------- ------

 

Cas’ flight is at seven and his stuff is in the trunk. He’ll have Gabriel send him the rest later. Not like there’s much, and it’s all in boxes at this point.

He knows he’s putting off the inevitable. He’ll call him after the car’s packed. No, he’ll call him from the road. No, he shouldn’t talk on the phone while he’s driving, he’ll call him at the airport. It’s a long drive to the airport. Plenty of time.

Halfway there he decides that he’s ridiculous, pulls over, gets out his phone, and stares down at the contact labeled 'Chuck, LSF'.

Twenty minutes later he still hasn’t called. As he pulls back out onto the highway, he thinks distantly that Dean won’t be surprised.

****

\---- --------- ------

****

Dean sets foot on the Festival’s grass at the stroke of five. The usual opening night madness is multiplied by ten this year, and everyone’s on edge. He goes backstage, gives his annual “don’t fuck it up” speech to the stagehands, and gets to work.

At five fifteen, someone says, “Anybody seen Castiel?”

Dean is numb.

 

\---- --------- -------

****

The line for security is too short, Castiel gets through too quickly, and he’s left with far too much time to sit and brood before his plane takes off. He finds a bar.

The plan is to get shitfaced enough to hate himself a little less, but only so much that he doesn’t feel guilty about making the flight staff deal with him. That falls through, though, when he stops after the first swig to stare down into his beer and mope.

It was the right thing to do, he thinks, listening to the generic oldies playing over the bar’s radio. People’s expectations were too high. He would fail them the second he stepped onstage. Thousands would show up expecting art, truth, a good sword fight, whatever it is people go to the theater for, and get him. Him, the pathetic lump of daddy issues that wouldn’t know a decent performance if it smacked him across the face. It’s better this way.

****

\---- --------- ------

 

The show starts in an hour and fifteen minutes, the lead is MIA, and people weren’t already freaked out enough.

The worst part, though, is that they all come asking Dean about it. He hides in the hair and makeup trailer, ignoring the increasingly panicked voices outside. The makeup gal, Becky, gives him a pitying look, and he pretends he doesn’t know why.

 ****  

\---- --------- ------

****

Castiel snorts to himself. Can he really believe that? That by not showing up, not calling, just vanishing off the face of the earth to a comfortable job far away, he’s helping anyone but himself? No, better to look at this as exactly what it is. Castiel’s too selfish to risk his own shame. The very real possibility of failure is too much to face, and god, what a failure it would be: failing the dreams he’d had since he was a kid, failing the production, Chuck and Crowley and all the other actors, failing the role, failing the playwright himself. But...no, even that’s not all it is.

He realizes that his greatest fear of all isn’t failing himself, but failing Dean.

Dean wants to be a director. Castiel can’t believe he hadn’t realized before Sam told him; it’s everywhere. Castiel knows what it’s like to _want_ something, that do-this-until-I-die, go-broke-and-live-in-a-cardboard-box fervor. He knows the look, and Dean has it. Those evenings they spent rehearsing together were nothing short of remarkable, and Dean must know it. He has a gift, and maybe, through Castiel, he was starting to see it.

What would it do to Dean, then, to watch him crash and burn?

If it were just the production at stake, the hard work and careers of hundreds, the opinion of thousands, and the rendering of an art that is nothing short of sacred to him and the telling of a story that cuts to the very core of human existence, Castiel could deal with the responsibility. But Dean’s well-being is at stake, and it’s too much.

“So, what’re you in for?”

  
\---- --------- ------

****

The show starts in forty-five minutes, and Chuck is freaking the fuck out.

“Dean.” He takes a steadying breath that doesn’t look like it does a whole lot of steadying and looks him straight in the eye. “You’re sure you haven’t seen-”

Dean whirls around from the prop table, where he’d been pretending to be productive, and snaps. “Christ almighty Chuck, why d’you keep askin’ me?! I swear I don’t have Cas concealed about my person, okay?!”

“Okay, okay, man, I geddit, I’m just asking if you’re, y’know, completelysure-”

“What’s with the freakin’ Spanish Inquisition, man? Why would I know where some actor fucked off to just in time for opening night?”

“I dunno, it’s just that you guys, y’know, you...”

Oh, no fucking way. “We what?” Dean snarls. “We WHAT?”

Chuck looks scared. Dean thinks that’s pretty smart.

“You guys, you. You, uh. You had a thing.”

“A thing.”

“Yeah. Y’know. You had the, the uh, the gazing. The gazing thing.”

“Fuck off, Chuck.”

“‘Kay.” Before he fucks off, he looks at Dean with something very like defeat in his tired eyes and groans, “Theater is _hard_.”

 

\---- --------- ------

****

Castiel jumps. A man is sitting on the stool next to him, and, judging by the drink in front of him, he’s been there a while.

“I...what?”

“Headin’ home to bury my fiance. You?”

“I’m sorry. Truly.”

“Know y’are. But that’s not what I asked.”

“....I don’t understand.”

The man gives him a grim smile. “It’s not late enough for anybody to be sittin’ alone in an airport bar. There’s a reason you’re here.”

“I have no reason. Nothing as terrible as yours.”

“And those, brother, are two different answers. You got somethin’. I sure as hell could use some conversation and I’ll betcha anything you could too. We both got time to kill. So talk.”

Castiel takes a drink. “I passed up a great opportunity.”

The man grins. “There ya go.” He sticks out his hand. “Benny.”

He takes it. “Castiel.”

“Good to meet you Castiel, even if that is the weirdest fuckin’ name I ever heard.” Benny tips back some whisky. “So. What sorta opportunity was this?”

“It was, uh. It was a role. I’m an actor, and I was offered the role of Macbeth. I’ve wanted it for...as long as I can remember.”

“Damn. That’s some ‘giving-up-on-your-dreams’ shit right there.” He looks genuinely confused when he says “Why’d you do it? If you wanted it so bad?”

“I guess...Shame, I guess. It’s hard to explain.”

“This ‘hard to explain’ got a name?”

“What?”

****

\---- --------- ------

****

The show starts in thirty minutes. The audience has been pouring in rapidly and settling onto their blankets and collapsible chairs, getting out their picnics and bugspray. A completely full house. Packed to the gills. Fanfuckingtastic.

The audience is getting suspicious. There’s a nervous energy buzzing in the park tonight: people in ties murmur up by the Info tent, Ash paces circles around the lights scaffold, and in the distance Crowley yells god-knows-what at god-knows-who.

Backstage, it isn’t much better. Somehow, everyone seems to be ready way earlier than usual, leaving them with nothing to do but wait. Management and tech find ways to occupy themselves: Balthazar taps away at his phone with even more intense concentration than usual. Becky’s had Cas’ costume laid out for the past twenty minutes and continually checks on it, as if to make sure that he hasn’t materialized inside it. The actors, though, just sit and stew. Adam starts up a game of War with a prop pack of cards; Meg burns through a few more cigarettes and throws Dean dubious looks.

Meanwhile, Gabriel does his damndest to distract the multitudes. Dean’s been watching this moron’s pre-show routine for eight years, and his ‘juggling fire while reciting sonnets in funny accents’ shtick has never been anything but a crowd-pleaser. Tonight, though, they sit quiet on their picnic blankets.

It doesn’t bode well.

Dean’s backstage by the trailers, sitting with Ed, Harry, Jo, and Sam in restless silence, when Gabriel comes around the corner. For the first time in eight years he’s missing his big cheesy grin, and it catches people’s attention.

Ruby looks up from her cards. “Yeah? What is it?”

“I’m going to break into my baby brother’s apartment,” Gabriel announces without preamble.

A voice directly behind Dean scares the crap out of him. “I’ll go with you.” Anna stands in the trailer doorway in full witch costume, and it’s a strange effect coupled with her red-rimmed eyes. “I’ll help you look.”

Gabriel snorts. “Sweetheart, I think I can search an apartment the size of the cell phone I had in the nineties by myself.”

“Gabriel.” Her voice is steady. “I’m helping.”

He shrugs. “Fair enough. C’mon.”

Everyone gets back to their own business. Before she heads off with Gabriel, Anna turns to Dean. She looks like hell, but her witch getup has nothing to do with it. “He’ll turn up?” she says to him, and it’s weird how it sounds like a question. “He wouldn’t miss this. He wouldn’t.”

For the first time tonight, Dean feels really fucking guilty.

****

\---- --------- ------

 

“I know how you actors are. They’ll pry your dream roles from your cold dead hands, am I right?” Benny smiles knowingly at Castiel over his glass. “So, there’s gotta be a girl in here somewhere.” Seemingly remembering the profession of which he’s speaking, he quickly amends “Girl, guy, whatever.”

Castiel sighs and, against his better judgement, says “Dean. His name’s Dean. It isn’t of import; I hardly knew him a week.”

Benny shrugs. “Whatever you say. Sounds important to me.”

“It’s complicated,” he says, and it sounds weak to his own ears. “I didn’t want to disappoint him. Playing Macbeth, I was sure to do just that.”

A flash of amusement crosses Benny’s face. “Y’know, my sister’s an actor. Thought there was some kinda superstition about that: not supposed to say the name out loud?”

Castiel nearly laughs. “We aren’t in a theater. The ‘curse’ isn’t applicable here.”

That's not the whole truth, though, not really. But Castiel doesn't know how to explain his sense of removal from that world to this stranger. Forever ago, he said that the words were like spells. He told Dean about their magic, and he understood. None of that matters now, though. Their spells, their curses; that magic isn't for him anymore. He doesn't deserve it.

The sentence has barely fallen from his mouth when the current song ends and a horrifically familiar floaty acoustic intro plays over the radio.

 _Oh no, please no_ , Castiel thinks desperately.

****

_‘Lovestruck Romeo, sings the streets a serenade...’_

****

\---- --------- ------

****

The play starts in thirty minutes. Chuck gathers the cast and crew backstage and tells them that if Cas doesn’t show in the next ten, he’ll make an announcement to the audience and everyone will go home.

****

\---- --------- ------

 

Castiel is slumped forward onto the bar, head buried in his arms, but Benny doesn’t comment. Instead he hums along, and then says with laughter in his voice “You know who else hardly knew each other a week...”

Under his cover of arms and sleeves, Castiel groans. “Oh God no, not that parallel, anything but that-”*

****

_‘Juliet, the dice was loaded from the start, and I bet, and you exploded in my heart..._ ’

****

He claws at his hair in frustration. “I never asked for this, I...I played _Benvolio_ -”

“Look.” Benny’s voice is curt. “All I’m sayin’ is that if you actor people can’t follow your dreams, then the rest of us are good and screwed.”

****

_‘When you gonna realize, it was just that the time was wrong, Juliet?_ ’

****

Castiel will insist until the end of his days that he left the bar just to escape that damn song.

****

\---- --------- -------

****

Ten minutes come and go. Chuck nods weakly, and heads toward the stage.

Dean sits in the wings with Sam. The audience outside is loud, even for opening night. The rest of the techies have congregated out back, making plans to get drinks and discuss their possible unemployment, and the brothers are left alone, leaning against the wall in the half-darkness. Sam stares at his hands. Dean has the urge to say something, and he doesn’t know what it is until it comes out in the form of “Sorry, Sammy.”

His little brother’s mop-esque head snaps up, and it’s weirdly hilarious, how confused he looks. “What?”

“Sorry.”

“Yeah, I heard y- what?”

“Godammit man, I said s-”

“I know what you said!” Sam yelps. He looks around, embarrassed, for a second before continuing in a whisper. “And now I’m saying, ‘What the hell’?”

(Onstage, Chuck starts talking. “Hi everyone! Welcome! Uh. Yeah.”)

****

\---- --------- ------

 

Castiel figures that, the way his luck’s been going lately, it’d only figure that he’d miss the fulfillment of his big spiritual revelation by getting pulled over for speeding. He keeps a steady 60 on the freeway, resisting the urge to floor the gas pedal of his beat up old Toyota Corolla. Barely. 

It’s 7:49. Castiel feels high, his blood thrums with an entirely alien wildness. He doesn’t think of his future. He doesn’t think of the life he’s throwing away. He’s full to bursting with something that he can’t quite name (maybe joy, or stupidity) and it makes him want to roll down the windows and yell and laugh for no reason, and his brain flings out a line, one of Meg’s: _I feel now the future in the instant.._.

It’s 7:53, and the future’s coming fast.

****

\---- --------- ------

****

Dean breathes. Man, this is not gonna be fun. He sees now, though, that it has to be said; hell, if he’s honest with himself, he’s known that for a pretty long time. “I’m sorry for being a dick. You didn’t...it hurt when you left, but that’s not what you were going for, and I’m sorry. You went to go live your own life and I was enough of an asshole to be mad at you for it.”

(Chuck continues on in the background. “What, uh. What great weather tonight! Yeah!”)

Dean turns to look at Sam, and he has that patient face on, the one that likes it when Dean actually expresses himself and won’t dare speak until he’s done.

“You...you didn’t do anything wrong,” Dean finishes. It’s easier to say than he expects it to be. Kind of like the words had been sitting there for a long time, waiting to be said.

(“I. Uh. I have some news.”)

****

\---- --------- ------

 

Once he enters the park, Castiel speeds all he wants.

He roars around the corner and into the parking lot, fishtailing spectacularly and scaring the shit out of a roving pigeon. Leaping out of the car, he tears out of the lot and through the grass, toward the lights and voices of the Festival in the distance. The crowd swims into focus in the darkness, and he hears Chuck’s voice, amplified through the sultry June night:

“I. Uh. I have some news.”

Castiel’s mind cooks up a string of Dean-worthy curses. He’s too busy running like hell to say any of them.

He rips through the murmuring crowd, sweating heavily with his heartbeat storming in his ears; leaps over picnic blankets and trips over folding chairs and angers several old ladies and steps in some poor boy’s pasta salad. He forms a singular understanding for the term “like a bat out of hell” as he charges for the front, while Chuck says “The play. Well, it’s-”

He lurches to a stop ten feet from the stage, flings his arms wide, and hopes to God Chuck can see through the stage lights.

 

\---- --------- ------

****

Sam looks sympathetic. The girl. “It wasn’t an easy time for either of us.” He nudges his shoulder into Dean’s in a rough but surprisingly affectionate gesture. “You’re my best friend, dude. You think I liked being on the other side of the country from you? I thought you...I thought you’d hate me forever. It was bad enough losing Dad.”

(“The play.” Even through the resonance of the mic he sounds like he wants to sink into the boards and never be seen again. “Well, the play...”)

Sam shakes his head. “I thought I’d lost you too.”

And that, Dean decides as he pulls his stupid kid brother in for weird sitting pseudo-hug, is just about enough of that.

“You’re not getting rid of me that easy, bitch.”

He feels Sam smile against his shoulder. “I’ll hold you to that.” A huff of a laugh. “Jerk.”

(“The play,” Chuck says for about the eighty-fifth time, “Well, it’s-”)

(He stops dead.)

(“It’s...It’s going great!”)

Dean lets go. “Wait.”

The voice over the microphone sounds joyful, but more than a little hysterical. “The play is on, like-like- just like you all know! Yeah! It’ll just be a few minutes!”

The brothers exchange confused looks. There’s commotion backstage, and Dean picks out several individual “What the hell...?!”s, from cast and crew alike.

“In just a few minutes, you’ll all enjoy our production of Ma- NO, um- of our play! Yeah! Enjoy the show, folks!”

Before Dean can say ‘What the fuck?’, the door between the wings and the audience swings open and Cas runs through.

****

\---- --------- ------

****

“It’s....it’s going great!” Chuck’s eyes have grown to twice their usual size and are glued to Castiel’s face. He appears to be experiencing some cross-emotion between ecstasy and nausea. Castiel empathizes.

He charges for the wings, flings open the door, smashes squarely into Dean’s gaze, and almost turns around and runs back.

****

\---- --------- -------

****

Dean’s life is getting fucking ridiculous.

He sits in the wings next to his little brother, back against the wall, staring up into Cas’ face, whose silhouette against the outside has some crazy backlighting shit going on and y’know what, no, this moment does _not_ get to be this dramatic. This is the point at which Dean calls bullshit on this whole damn week, because this is not how life works.

“Hello, Dean,” Cas says, and it’s pretty freakin’ dramatic.

Dean doesn’t get time to make a response before the whole backstage explodes: someone gasps “CAS?”, a few people cheer, Anna looks like she might punch something, Becky makes some sort of shrieking sound, and Cas is dragged bodily into the costume trailer.

It’s for the best, anyway, Dean reflects. Not like he would’ve had any idea what to say.

****

The play will begin in ten minutes.

****

\---- --------- -------

****

In the trailer, Becky slaps makeup onto Castiel with all the force of a deeply wronged woman while Rufus chews him out for missing fight call*.

“Boy, you know how goddamn dangerous that is?!”

Before Castiel can say a word, Becky steps in, reminding him very much of some hyenas caught in a territorial dispute he’d seen on Discovery channel once. Her eyes are rays-of-death intense as she shouts, “Whadduya wanna do about it, Rufus?! I have to have him looking all bloody and battled-up before _the hurlyburly’s done and the battle’s lost and won_ which I will remind you is in TEN FUCKING MINUTES.”

Rufus sizes her up, takes a deep breath. Finally, he crouches down, stares unflinchingly into Castiel’s eyes, and, in a whisper that is nothing short of murderous, says “Are you Equity?”*

Castiel swallows. He shakes his head.

Rufus nods. “Praise the fuckin’ lord.” He straightens up and points right into Castiel’s face. “Don’t go suein’ me if you get your ass killed out there.”

Outside the trailer, Castiel hears many voices call “ _Thankyouten_ ”* and comes to the conclusion that getting his ass killed out there isn’t entirely unlikely.

 

\---- --------- ------

****

Dean’s positioned stage left, hiding in the shadows, as the lights go down. He’s enclosed in complete blackness as he guides the crew: they creep behind the set, carefully, _carefully godammit Jo_ , unleashing the dry ice. Everything’s in position, awaiting his ‘okay’ to the tech booth. That’s how it works around here: when Dean says the word, it’s go time.

He’s gone into full-on techie mode; his skin pulses with it, the electricity of opening night. It’s a swelling, intoxicating, terrifying sensation of _this is it_ , all that we’ve worked for, and now it’s game time. Sink or swim. The vacuumed silence of two thousand held breaths chokes the night, and the fate of the next two hours hangs in the balance.

For a moment, just a moment, Dean holds the universe in his hands.

He brings his walkie talkie to his lips, and whispers “Go.”

Ash brings up the lights.

They go.

****

\---- --------- ------

****

Castiel waits in the wings. It’s such a normal part of his existence that he can almost pretend that the house lights haven’t just gone down, the audience fallen silent.

Chuck stands next to him in silent camaraderie. He looks faintly green. It’s probably just the lighting.

When the blackout fades, the stage is murky with smoke under dusky bluish lights. Three figures creep into the dimness. Castiel hears Anna’s voice ring out clear through the dark and the humidity, but it isn’t Anna’s voice anymore, it’s something different, something sinister...

****

_“When shall we three meet again? In thunder, lightning, or in rain?”_

****

The play has begun.

****

\---- --------- -------

****

They’re underway, and Dean lets out the breath he’s been holding for approximately two and a half hours. He’s about to take his usual position backstage right, but then he remembers who’s no doubt waiting back there to make his stage right entrance in the next scene.

It’s not that he’s avoiding him, he assures himself. That’d be a major wuss move. No, Dean’s not avoiding Cas. He’s just deliberately not going where Cas is.

Dean groans into his hands.

If people were acting weird before Cas got there, now they’re downright obnoxious. Sam’s been throwing him his _follow your dreams Dean_ look every thirty seconds, and Jo keeps doing this weird eyebrow wiggle thing that he guesses is supposed to be seductive. Even Balthazar, when Dean literally ran into him back by the trailers, instead of an apology gave a knowing sort of scoff.

Dean knows what they all think, sure he does. Why he winds up bitching to Meg about it, though, is a mystery for the ages.

They’re back by the prop table and she’s finishing off her last pre-show cigarette when the bitching commences. “Why does everybody keep fucking looking at me? I caught Banquo- uh, what’s-his-face, Sam-an-whatever-”

“He goes by Alfie,” she says, blowing smoke from her blood-colored lips. “Can’t blame the poor kid.”

“Yeah. Him. I caught him lookin’ at me like I was dying or something! Christ, he’s the one who’s getting knifed later!”

Meg smirks, and Dean seriously considers rethinking his position on hitting girls.

“Deano, don’t play dumb. We know the score.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

She rolls her eyes. “How you and Laurence Olivier over there,” she jerks her head toward the wings, “have been making the beast with two backs despite your abandonment issues, his inferiority complex, and both of your buttloads of Daddy Doesn’t Love Me Syndrome. And now he’s back from the corporate dead and the two of you would be having your big gay reunion as we speak if you weren’t still scared that he’s gonna dump your pretty ass again and go running home to Daddy.” She tilts her head thoughtfully. “I miss anything?”

For a moment, Dean just gapes.

“That’s- that’s not- shut up!” It’s lame and he knows it. So does Meg. He barrels on. “Fuckin’ actors! Why do you always have to be up in everybody’s shit all the time? Don’t get enough drama in your day jobs?”

Meg quirks an eyebrow, smiling like the cat that got the canary and then killed your whole family. “All the world’s a stage, Dean.”

He really, really wants to hit her.

****

\---- --------- -------

****

(“What bloody man is that? He can report, as seemeth by his plight, of the...)

The play, utterly ambivalent to Castiel’s sheer terror as plays tend to be, trucks right along into the second scene. The witches’ dry ice is hauled away under its trapdoors and the lights go up, sounds of artillery filling the stage and the big empty night beyond. Anna doesn’t break her stride as she leaves the stage, but shoves deftly through the wings, red hair glinting bloodily, marches right up into Castiel’s space, and smacks him hard across the jaw.

Castiel makes a noise kind of like _Aaahgchh!_ “What in the f-”

She shoves herself even closer, in a way that Castiel imagines Dean would most certainly classify as ‘up in his grille’. She shouts at him in her best backstage-voice: “You are such a- such a fucking- I-” Anna stutters hopelessly for a moment, face going steadily redder, until she takes a steadying breath and stares him in the eyes.

“Castiel, you are a cullionly barber-monger, a knave, a rascal, an eater of broken meats, a whoreson zed, an unnecessary letter, nothing but the composition of a knave, beggar, coward, pandar, and the son and heir of a mongrel bitch! Cowardly rascal! Nature disclaims in thee, a taylor made thee-!”

Castiel rolls his eyes, stopping her short. “King Lear, Anna, really?”

She drops back onto her heels, her fire extinguished, and returns his eye-roll. “I had a crush on Kent in high school. Sue me.”

“I remember. We used to argue about it.”

“Because you said that Edmund was the sexiest character in the play, and that’s just flat-out wrong.”

Castiel smiles, suddenly nostalgic. He rubs the back of his neck, a nervous habit. “Kent has some good zingers, I’ll give him that.”

“Cas.” He hears the shift in her tone. “What the hell were you thinking?”

He sighs. “I don’t know. I was ashamed, I guess, of...” Of what? He can hardly remember now, he can hardly think at all; every word said out there on stage is one word closer to his cue. He flings his hands uselessly. “I don’t know.”

Unexpectedly, Anna smiles. It’s one he remembers- a warm, melting kind, so big her face might just get stuck that way. “I don’t understand, Cas. How...” She looks sideways through the darkness, out into the sunny glow of the stage lights, before turning that smile back to him. “How did you ever think you could leave the life?”

“I...”

She spreads her hands wide, grin splitting her face in half, like she’d hug the whole shining night if she could. “Is there any better feeling than this?!” she hisses, and if she weren’t valiantly maintaining a backstage whisper she’d clearly be shouting to the rooftops. Her joy is infectious. “Seriously, Cas, this-” She makes a vague _this_ sort of gesture at Castiel. “This right now, does it get any better than this?”

Last week- hell, even yesterday- the answer would’ve been a resounding ‘no’. Even when he had one line, there was nothing in the world better than this. The panic is parting ever so slightly to make way for that gorgeous feeling Anna’s talking about, the one that makes you sick to your stomach with it; actors are closet adrenaline junkies, Castiel’d always speculated.

It’s dulled, though, with the knowledge that somewhere in these wings Dean hates him, and is unlikely to ever stop.

He does his best to shake off his moroseness; Anna’s always been too wise for her own good, and, once again, she’s correct. He smiles in return, searches for something to say. “I like when the story’s good and the audience is listening.”

She smacks him (lightly this time) on the arm. “You stole that from _Slings and Arrows_ *.”

Castiel is unruffled. “What of it.”

“We were having a moment!”

Castiel cuffs her playfully in response. “Hey, isn’t that your cue?”

“Shit.” She stabs an accusing finger toward his chest. “We’re not done here.”

“Certainly not.”

Even once she’s gone onstage, Castiel finds himself still smiling in the dark.

****

\---- --------- ------

****

(“The time approaches that will, with due decision, make us know what we shall say we have, and what we owe.”)

Dean doesn’t give a crap if Cas is about to enter stage right in about a minute and a half, he’ll pace wherever he goddamn well pleases.

Even if he didn’t know this play backwards and front, he’d know that Third Messenger was about to have his time to shine, due to the random ensemble member bobbing up and down next to him, bubbling over with excitement for his new line. Dean will never understand actors.

He’s not sure how he feels about the fact that it was this easy to replace Cas’ original role, but he doesn’t have much time to reflect on it, since the guy (‘Garth’, apparently) is chatting his ear off.

“Y’know, this is my first professional acting job. Yup, right outta school! And they gave me Castiel’s line, can you believe it? I mean, before I just came on and told Meg that ‘The king comes here to-night’, but now I get to tell everybody that she’s dead!” He snickers while Dean finds his happy place.

“Hey, who knows...”

The guy chatters on but Dean is distracted by Cas entering the dark space, a bucket of stage blood held carefully between his hands. He’s walking this way. And- because it’s an outdoor stage and the ‘wings’ are really just cramped clapboard boxes slapped on either side so it was bound to happen eventually- they lock eyes.

“...maybe some night Castiel will fall and break his leg and _I’ll_ get to play Macbeth!”

It should be of no surprise to Dean at this point when a lot of things happen at once.

He only has time to remember that Cas’ eyes are always bluer in real life than they are in Dean’s head before Cas stumbles in the dimness, trips on a loose board, and falls forward, bucket and all. The word ‘Macbeth’ has barely fallen from Garth’s mouth when he gets a face full of syrupy red.

Of fucking course.

Garth sputters wetly, Dean opens and closes his mouth like a particularly stunned fish, and someone on stage yells out a couplet. Cas tears his gaze from the gore to stare, wide-eyed, at Dean. “That’s my cue,” he gasps.

Dean’s heart stops. It doesn’t, actually, that was a metaphor. But its beats hammering in his ears suddenly sound a whole lot like _Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck_.

Cas squares his shoulders, matter-of-factly says “Shit,” and marches out into the light, leaving Dean and Garth to look at each other and freak the fuck out.

“I can’t go out like this!” Garth whispers frantically. He paws the gore from his face, but it’s no use; his costume’s soaked in the stuff, screamingly red against the beige.

“Yeah, no shit!” Dean snaps. He runs his hand through his hair, trying his damndest to _calm the fuck down_ because Cas has just declared from onstage that he’s already “forgot the taste of fears” and if someone doesn’t show up to tell him that the queen, my lord, is dead, it’s gonna be bad news. If Dean had a spare moment he’d take this opportunity to reflect that, for all of Cas’ significant inferiority complexes, when it comes down to it that old middle school drama class cliche that there are ‘no small parts, only small actors’ is pretty freakin’ true no matter how stupid it is, and it was that squinty fucker’s own fault all of his hopes and dreams were nearly crushed by corporate America, because he was being a ‘small actor’, whatever the hell that means.

 _Not the moment, Winchester_ , he thinks.

He focuses. Garth looks like Carrie at the prom and Dean has the span of five iambic feet to make a really stupid decision.

He looks Garth square in the eye, says “Shit.”, and marches from the wings into the light.

They don’t tell you that stage lights make a sound, but they do: a thunderous whirring sort of sound. Then again, that might just be the sound of Dean’s heart catapulting itself up into his throat as a thousand eyes latch onto him when he takes center stage. Right then, he remembers precisely why he’s a techie and not an actor. It’s hot and bright and he’s never felt more exposed in his life. Thank God or Buddha or William Shakespeare or Whoever that he can’t see the audience because he’s about to hurl as it is. Beneath the blind panic he feels a swoop of something like awein his stomach; Cas has been out here at the mercy of the audience and their watching stares for _two hours_.

Speaking of Cas. He hasn’t seen Dean yet- he’s downstage, facing toward the audience while the last syllables of his _‘Come at me, bro’_ of a monologue hang in the air. Offstage, there are a few distant screams. Cas turns to speak to Messenger Number 3, but he only gets as far as “Wherefo-” before he stops dead, staring.

Only Dean Fucking Winchester, Dean Fucking Winchester thinks to himself, would take this moment to appreciate just being close to Cas. Here under the orange onslaught of the lights he can make out each individual rivulet of sweat that crawls down Cas’ face (there are a lot) and sticks strands of dark hair to his forehead. He can see that his mic is about to slip off if someone doesn’t retape it soon. He sees the almost imperceptible parting of his lips and widening of his eyes as he takes Dean in, like he’s a dream, an apparition, a soap bubble; something that might explode and disappear any second. Then, quick as he appeared, Cas is gone.

Macbeth asks, “Wherefore was that cry?”

Dean replies, “The queen, my lord, is dead.”

“....She should have died hereafter.”

Dean leaves at the end of the speech, and it occurs to him that he probably should have exited sooner.

But then he hears “Blow wind, come wrack! At least we’ll die with harness on our back!”, and Cas is striding offstage like he fucking owns the place (he totally fucking does) and as soon as he hits the dimness of the wings he’s beelining for Dean, who knows exactly what Cas is about to do but it doesn’t make it any less awesome when it happens.

With just a breath between them Cas stops short. It’s the soap bubble thing all over again when he, so painfully gently, takes each of Dean’s hands in his own, tilts his head, and presses their lips together. It’s soft but needing, somehow, like an apology. And that’s bullshit, so Dean throws his arms around him, fists a hand in his hair, and pries his mouth open.

Behind them, Garth wolf-whistles, Meg snickers, and Sam pretends to hurl.

A war is waging onstage and their friends are laughing at them, but they’re gone to the world, kissing slowly and thoroughly in the darkness. Dean strokes through Cas’ hair, spreading his fingers down to cradle his neck, while Cas moves his grip to the front of Dean’s shirt. He curls his hands into the fabric, tightly, deliberately, and Dean wants to believe that he isn’t imagining the promise in that: _I’m not going anywhere. Not this time._

Dean draws back just barely from Cas’ lips, only enough to press their foreheads together and breathe out, with fuck-it-all desperation, “Don’t run out on me like that.”

Cas’ hands slide around to Dean’s back, hugging him tightly. He feels Cas’ words against his mouth more than he hears them. “No one’s leaving you anymore, Dean.”

Dean wonders if he’d been holding in some huge breath without realizing it, or if that was some weird gaspy sob he just pulled. He doesn’t care. It should scare him, because he very adamantly does not get involved like this, but there’s nothing else he can say, there’s no other word in the English language in that moment but “Stay.”

Cas’ response almost gets lost in the kiss he presses against Dean’s mouth: “Okay.”

They stand there for a breath, sharing an indistinct feeling of change. The future in the instant.

Then Dean smirks, prying a reluctant Cas from his chest and pushing him toward the stage. “That’s your cue, hot stuff.”

Cas almost makes it on without having to turn back for another kiss. Almost.

Dean waits until he hears a gravelly voice thunder “They have tied me to a stake, I cannot fly” until sinking back against the wall, a happy bonelessness in his stance and a dopey smile stuck on his face for eternity.

He risks a glance toward his little brother.

Sam raises an eyebrow.

“Shut up,” Dean snaps. He’s still smiling.

 

\---- --------- ------

 

_three years later_

 

\---- --------- ------

 

When Castiel steps into the men’s trailer, he finds his locker is covered in a couple dozen colorful sticky notes.

He looks around to a room of quickly averted smiles, a few snickers. “What’s this?”

It’s Adam who fesses up, grinning sheepishly. “Well, hey, it’s probably your last opening night around here, what with you and Dean moving after the run, and....” He pulls his tabard on over his head, becomes entangled, and through the fabric says something that might be “It was Becky’s idea.”

While Andy helps pry Adam lose, Castiel turns to his locker and reads.

 

_Eyo, Castibell! Knock ‘em out, and give the king an extra stab for me._

_-Gabe_

_**** _

_Hi Castiel,_

_Break a leg! Unfortunately, I won’t be back there this time with quarterstaffs to help you with that one. I’m sure you’ll be awesome._

_Best of luck,_

_Sam_

_p.s.: Sorry for the lame joke._

_**** _

_hey hubby,_

_Another day, another lead, huh? Kick some ass for me. I’ll be back again next year, and if you’re not at those auditions so help me I’ll drag your ass back from Chicago myself._

_Meg_

_**** _

_Cas,_

_Thank you for being the best friend anyone could ever ask for. I wish you the best of luck in Chicago, even though you sure won’t be needing it. Now all you need to do is figure out Skype! Really, it’s not that hard._

_I’m so, so proud of you. See you onstage!_

_Much love,_

_Anna_

****

Castiel glances through them, too many to read all at once, and slowly becomes speechless. Everyone in the cast and crew wrote him some sort of message: reminisces, compliments, wishes for good luck in Chicago. Even Balthazar left something:

****

_Cassie,_

_Don’t suck._

_B_

****

It’s not until a few minutes later, when he goes to gather his costume from the rack, that he sees the final note, written on a piece of looseleaf and impaled through his hanger:

****

_Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?_

_Thou makest me hotter and stickier._

****

(Behind him, Alfie says “Why are you blushing, Cas?”)

****

_Break a leg. I love you._

_**** _

_Dean_

**  
**

\---- --------- ------

 ****  

Another year, another pre-show pep talk in the wings. Dean’s just sent the crew kids good and scared to their positions when he feels a familiar warmth press against his back.

“‘Thou makest me hotter and stickier’? Seriously?”

Dean grins and spins around, planting a good and thorough kiss on Cas before Becky can find them and yell at him about smearing Cas’ stage makeup for the eighty-seventh time.

“You love it,” he says.

“I do a little bit,” Cas deadpans.

Dean laughs. Cas, incidentally, looks super hot right now, in his all-black costume and artfully mussed hair. Can’t mess up the makeup, Dean reminds himself. He does the logical thing and goes in for Cas’ neck instead.

“Dean.”

“Mmph?”

“I don’t know how much a hickey would contribute to Hamlet’s character.”

“While Horatio and Marcellus are out huntin’ ghosts Hamlet and Ophelia have a fervent makeout session.”

“I doubt Anna would agree with that reading. Besides, we’re at places.”

He groans, drawing himself away. “Intermission?” he asks hopefully.

Cas delivers a truly magnificent eye roll. “Have we reached that level of unprofessionalism? Intermission quickies?”

“Aw, fine, be no fun. Hey, you enter left, don’t you?”

“Yes, I was on my way before I was attacked.”

“Yeah, yeah,” He drawls. He gives Cas a shove. “Break your legs.”

Before he ducks around to the other side of the stage, Cas stops to give Dean an ominous look. “Don’t say that too seriously.” He turns to leave.

“Hey,” Dean calls.

Cas turns back, meets Dean’s eyes. And, because he's an asshole who can read Dean's mind, he says “I love you too.” He goes.

A few minutes later, Dean sits in the dark on the same folding chair he’s been sitting in for a decade, watching Chuck’s opening speech.

“Yeah, so, enjoy _Hamlet_!”

The applause swells. A moment later Dean feels Chuck standing beside him, exuding his usual nervous energy.

“Hey.” Dean nudges him. “It’s gonna be great.”

“Yeah.” There’s a smile in Chuck’s whisper. “I know it will be.” He returns the nudge. “We decided on the play for next year.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Strictly confidential, of course.”

“’Course.”

“I’ll give you a hint, though: it starts with ‘The’ and ends with ‘Tempest’.”

“Gotcha.”

“So, yeah, if you guys feel like an extended vacation next year...”

Dean snorts. “Dude, if you try to stick him with Prospero before he’s thirty, I’ll kick your ass.”

“Riiiight!” Chuck scoffs. Outside, the blackout is falling. “C’mon man, we already handed him Macbeth AND Hamlet- we don’t love your boy _that_ much.”

True, he thinks, Cas’ luck has been awesome; everybody’s falling all over themselves to cast the guy who did the best Macbeth anyone’s seen in years and pulled it off in five days. Not that he’s doing too bad himself, Dean remembers happily. There’s a young upstart theater company in Chicago that’s getting some pretty damn good buzz, and, for God knows what reason, they want Dean Winchester for artistic director. Something inside him glows warm at the thought.

That never stops feeling good.

Dean winks, even if it is pitch black in the wings. “We’ll be back in forty years for Lear.”

The post-blackout creepy music begins, humming softly through the night. Chuck sounds nervous again. “Seriously, man, if you guys ever wanna blow a summer in crappy old Lawrence...I’m not supposed to play favorites and stuff, but there’s always a place for both of you.”

“Thanks, man. I mean it.” He does.

The sound kicks on: wind whistles hoarsely through the speakers. Dean can hear a knowing smile in Chuck’s voice. “You’ll miss it around here.”

“You douchebags? I’m runnin’ while I still got a chance.”

The lights go up. Just a little- it’s a dark night outside the castle Elsinore.

Dean looks over at the shadowy side of Chuck’s face, and decides that this moment calls for something other than his usual smartassery. “It’s the highlight of my year, man. And I’ll always be grateful.”

Dean looks out and, across the stage, sees Cas waiting at the entrance to the wings.

“Who’s there?” asks Bernardo.

Even in the dark, he can see Cas smile at him. Dean grins.

The play’s beginning.

 

 _(Exeunt_ )


End file.
